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THE RELATION OF CHILDREN

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THEIR PROPER CHRISTIAN NURTURE.

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REV. JOHN THOMPSON DD

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MONTREAL:
WILLIAM DRYSDALE & CO, PUBLISHERS.

1893.

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Entered according f.o Act of Parliament of Canada, in the year
eighteen hundred and ninety-three, by William Drysuale & Co.,
in the Office of the Minister of Agriculture.

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PREFACE.

The following chapters do not profess to be a full
and formal discussion of the themes embraced, but
rather a practical exhibition and enforcement of
certain great lines of duty. And yet, the whole
subject of " The Relation of Children and of Families
to the Church " : " The Culture and Training of the
Young": " Home-Life and Family Religion," etc.,
is carefully discussed, and what we deem to be
Scriptural positions on these important points are laid
down.

From long acquaintance with certain tendencies of
thought, and currents of modern Christian life, it is
our deep conviction that there is much unscriptural
teaching and serious danger ahead, and that the
earnest attention of fathers and mothers, of Sabbath
school teachers and trainers of the young, must be
directed afresh to these subjects. The Church is in-
danger of drifting away from her moorings on this
whole question, and even many who are right in tJieory
are wrong in their practice. And every error in the

PREFACE.

things of God is dangerous, and especially here, where
the spiritual interests of the young are concerned.

On the subject of Christian culture and the growth
in grace of the young, there is much misunderstanding
and confusion. \Vc have broken up organic relations
and individualized, taking what is true, only in certain
instances and under certain conditions, to be the
normal type of Christian experience and life in all
instances and under every condition, and much
practical error is the consequence, even on the part
of those who ought to know better.

It was not because we imj.gined that we had
anything new to say, or any startling disclosure to
make, that has led us to write. And yet, had we not
supposed that we had something of importance to
say, and something, moreover, that the Church needs
to hear at this particular time, we would not have
written at all. For most certainly it was not the
mere desire of authorship that has led us to give this
volume to the public. We have all along felt we
were dealing only with plain, Scriptural truths ;
insisting on what the Church has always professed,
in theory, to believe ; giving little children and the
young the place in the Church that Christ gave
them ; and have simply claimed for them the culture
and training that He designed them to have. But,
probably, in this age of new theologies higher

\ ■

PREFACE.

criticisms, and novel methods, nothing could be a
greater novelty or a more urgent necessity than an
old truth neu'ly stated, and, enforced by old consider-
ations, set in new lights. This is all we have
attempted to do, and, in fact, it was all that was
necessary to be done. We believe most earnestly in
Evolution^ — the bringing of the new things out of
the old ; new and fresh duties from old principles ;
never breaking away from, but maintaining the con-
nection with, all the past.

Within the last few years, the mind of the Church
has been turned very specially to the care of the
young, and the proper religious teaching of children.
And all who have them in charge are eager to hear
the subject discussed, but, on such occasions, there is
often much said, from which we most emphatically
dissent.

We have many earnest, fiery speeches at conven-
tions, from men more accustomed to talk than to
think. They tell us about the conversion of children,
and furnish specimens : they discuss the proper age
for conversions : we are told in our annual Church
reports of the number who have ''■joined the Church '*
from the Sabbath school, and the inference is drawn
that all the others are outside of the Church; and,
occasionally, the broad statement is made that they
are the slaves of the devil, and on the broad road to

Vlll

PREFACE.

destruction. But not one word is ever heard of the
glorious possibility, and blessed fact, of the growth in
grace of children from the womb, or that by covenant
promise the faith of the parents will be that of the
children, and that the Christian home is the great
School of Christ.

The great question now is : " How to get up a
revival." But there is a prior question to this :
" How to bring up the children in the nurture and
admonition of the Lord."

That man does a great work for Christ who is
instrumental in converting a sinner from the error of
his ways. This is talked about by everybody. But
how much greater the work — though you never hear
it spoken of — so to teach and train a child, that it
never needs to be converted. It is a blessed thing to
reclaim a sinner and set his feet on the way of peace.
But it is more blessed to keep the young in the way
of life. Many a mother who has claimed her home
for the Lord, who has trained her children for Him,
till they have gone forth to occupy conspicuous
places in the Church, is never heard of, and her name
is never mentioned at a convention. She has been
content to minister to the Church in her hoicse, and is
not classed among the Christian workers. But the
Lord knows and approves of her work as most
honouring to Him, and she will not lose her reward.

PREFACE,

The groat need of the Church to-day is a revival
of Home religion, and tlie turning of the hearts of the
fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children
to the fathers.

The volume is specially intended for Christian
parents, Sabbath school teachers, elders, and, as a
minister of some years and experience, we may include
our younger brethren. And if any of the Fathers in
the ministry may look into its pages in a spare hour,
let us hope that what they read will meet their
approval, and serve to give a fresh setting to an old
truth, with which they have long been familiar.

CONTENTS.

Preface ...

Under Both Dispensations we have only One Church
The Children of the Church
The f\imilies of the Church

The Care ?.k1 Nurture of the Church

The Claims and Expectations of the Church

Variety of Christian Life and Experience .

Family Life

• '■•■•.

Family Religion

The Home : Womrn's Work in the Church

Home-Life of Our Lord

The Practical Uses of the Ikptism of Infants

Growth in the Divine Life

Pace

• 45
69

• 99

• '47
i6i

iSi
201

2^S
245

^•wn.^"

M||>p»^Wllii||p H

■

■■^^T ■

UNDER BOTH DISPENSATIONS WE HAVE
ONLY ONE CHURCH.

11 !

And I will establish my covenant between ine and thee and thy
seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a
God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee. — Gen. xvii., 7.

This is he that was in the church in the wilderness. —Acts vii., 38.

And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and h<^irs accord-
ing to the promise. — Gal. iii., 29.

That the blessing of Al)raham might come on the Gentiles through
Jesus Christ. —Gal. iii., 14.

And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets,
Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone. — Eph. ii., 20.

^. I

i I

TWO DISPENSATIONS— ONE CHURCH.

THERE HAS BEEN ONLY ONE CHURCH.

That children were embraced in the covenant that
God made with Abraham is admitted by all ; but
some hold that this was not a Church covenant, as it
embraced only temporal blessings, and chiefly the
promise of the land of Canaan. It is said the old
dispensation was outward and ceremonial, whereas
the new is inward and spiritual. Natural birth and
an outward profession constituted membership in the
former ; spiritual birth and faith are the on'y condi-
tions of the latter.

But this is not true. When a proselyte entered
the Jewish Church he made a profession of the true
religion and a promise of obedience, and any parent
who did what he professed to do, was as truly saved
as any professing Christian now. The Hebrew pro-
mised to take God as his God ; he promised obedience
to his law.s, and to exercise faith in the Divine pro-
mises ; and what does the Christian parent more to-
day? So that both dispensations are identical in

!r;

ONE CHURCH.

nature, however they may differ in regard to externals.
The visible Church has always consisted of the pro-
fessors of the faith together with their children, and
these have been her members under both disj^en-
sations.

The covenant made with Abraham was the
covenant of grace, and the same on which the Church
rests to-day. The blessings promised were spiritual
rather than national, for the Jews did not exist as a
nation for centuries after this. It is called an ever-
lasting covenant, and not a mere temporary arrange-
ment that was to pass away as the nationality of the
Jews has passed away for ever. In that covenant
God promised to be a God to Abraham and to his
seed ; what more is He to us than our God ? That
covenant embraced more than temporal blessings, for
it was, as Paul declares, confirmed of God in Christ.
Abraham rejoiced to see Christ's day, and he saw it
and was glad. Paul also tells us that Abraham had
the Gospel preached to him. The covenant then
being the same, the Church resting on this covenant
has always been the same. The Church in the days
of Abraham ; the Church in the time of Moses ; the
Church during our Lord's life on earth ; and the
Church of God in our own day, is the One Church
founded on the same covenant made with Abraham,
and which is the Church's charter still.

f^R
m

ONE CHURCH.

This same church, founded on the same covenant,
has always been administered through iJie same
Mediator. The Saviour now, was the Angel of the
covenant then, whose blood was shed from the founda-
tion of the world. Sinners were saved then in the
same way as they are saved now, and by the same
Saviour. Since God and man have had dealings
with each other, there has been only one Mediator
between God and Man, the man Christ Jesus, and in
every age men have come to the Father by Him.

The Church is represented as an Olive tree,
(Rom. xi., 16-21), and though some branches have
been lopped off, and others grafted in, the identity of
the tree has not been destroyed. As the Apostle
argues, the same root and trunk continue, the same
olive tree under the care of the same husbandman.
The removal of the Jews because of their unbelief
and the bringing in of the Gentiles, are just the lopping
off of one branch to make room for another on the
same stem, and by-and-bye both will grow together
again on the same trunk and from the same root.

The propJiecies and promises made to the Church
are the same, and cover her whole history from the
beginning till the consummation of all things. Only
one Church is embraced which was to arise and shine,
and Gentiles come to her light, and kings to the
brightness of her rising. The Old Testament Church

ONE CHURCH.

l|ii

vas to be enlarged but not abrogated. " Then shalt
thou sec and flow together and be enlarged because
the abundance of the sea shall be converted unto
thee." This one Church was to be built on a founda-
tion composed of both Prophets and Apostles, Jesus
Christ himself being the chief corner-stone. All the
Gentiles are fellow-heirs of the same body, and are
partakers of Christ by the Gospel. Abraham's seed
are Christ's children, and Christ's children are Abra-
ham's seed. They who are of faith the same are the
children of Abraham, Gal. iii.,29. God promised that
in Abraham's seed all the nations of the earth should
be blessed ; and this was the promise unto which
" Our twelve tribes instantly serving God day and
night hope to come." Hence it is said, the blessing
of Abraham is come upon us.

The commonweaWi of Israel ivas the Church. It
is called the church in the wilderness. Acts vii., 38.
The Hebrews were chosen from among the other
nations not {or political but religious purposes. They
were to be the depositaries of the truth, to whom
were committed the oracles of God. To them as
God's covenant people pertained the adoption, and
the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the
law, and the service, and the promises, Rom. ix., 4.
The pious Hebrews are described as those who hoped
in Christ before his advent, Eph. 1., 12. Nothing

ONE CHURCH.

more spiritual can be affirmed of the Church now !
Surely that was a spiritual church whose members
are said: (i) To have believed on Christ; (2) To
have sought a heavenly country ; (3) Were justified
by faith ; (4) Of whom the world was not worthy ;
(5) For whom God had prepared a city ; (6) Who
are now set down at the right hand of God. All this
was said of the members of the Old Covenant, and
what more can be said of the Church now ?

God pointed Abraham to the stars, and asked
if he could count them — " So shall thy seed be for
multitude." He asked him to look at the sand
lying by the sea-shore, and again said — " So shall thy
seed be for multitude." Now, what seed is meant ?
His descent by blood, or by faith} The natural J etVy
ox the spiritual} Israel after the Jiesh, or IsrSioX after
the spirit} Sure it must mean the latter, for the Jews
have never been a numerous nation ; how few in
numbers when compared to China, India, Russia, or
Britain ! Of what value would the covenant be if it
were only Abraham's natural descent, for there have
been many nations more numerous and powerful with-
out any covenant ? But they who believe in Christ
are the children of Abraham, and heirs according to
the promise. Abraham is the father v f the faithful, and
his spiritual children are to be as the sand for multitude,
— "A g;eat multitude which no man can number."

d r»

,i .11

I 11

OA/-E CHURCH.

The saints of old worshipped the same God as
we do now, and came to Him through the same way
of life ; and all through the spiritual history of the
world there has been the same dependence on the
same Holy Spirit, while God's true children have had
the same experience of his grace ; they sang the
same songs of praise, and presented the same peti-
tions. And how can that be a different Church which
is bound to the Church now by so many spiritual
ties that meant the same then as now. — Ore God
and Father of all, one Mediator and Saviour, one
Spirit of Life, one inward grace and experience, one
hope and home in all ages. The God of Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob is our covenant God ; and our
Saviour to-day was the Saviour of all his Saints who
lived before His Advent.

If any further proof were needed to show that
the Christian Church was a continuation of the patri-
archal or Abrahamic, we have such proof in the fact
that tJie Apostles never attempted to set up any neiv
organisation, but built on a foundation already laid.
All admit that the New Testament era opened fully
out on the day of Pentecost. But we find the first
Christian Church existing before that day, and con-
vened by authority to exercise one of the highest
functions belonging to any church, viz., to choose an
Apostle in the place of Judas. These 120 disciples

ONE CHURCH.

formed the membership of the first Christian Church,
and we find them all assembled again on the day of
Pentecost, all of one accord in one pi' je. To this
membership the 3,000 were added. But neither the
apostles, nor yet the 120 disciples, ever received water
baptism, but were accepted without it, and why?
Because they had already been received into the
Church, and their membership recognized by circum-
cision, and they had never lost their standing by
rejection of Christ, but passed over from the member-
ship of the Old, into the New Testament Church,
fully recognized by the rite which had the same
signification that baptism was to have now.

When, four days before his death, Christ pronounced
the sentence of excommunication on the people for
their apostacy, it did not affect those who were in
good standing when Christ was crucified, and who
carried their membership from the one Church to the
other. And around this nucleus the New Testament
Church was gathered, and was composed of members,
some of whom had been received by cirauucision
under the former dispensation, and others by baptism
under the new ; yet all now stood on equal terms in
the same Church.

But it may be asked, " Why, then, were those Jews
baptized who afterwards believed the Gospel, when
they, too, had already received the rite of circumcision,

O^E CHUKCU.

■ t

if this meant the same as baptism ? When we receive
excommunicated members back again into the
Church, we do not re-baptize them. But the cases
are not parallel. The unbelieving Jews had been cut
off undc a former dispensation, and during the time
of their separation and exclusion from the Church of
God, baptism had been instituted in the place of
circumcision as the initiatory rite into the Christian
Church. And now, when on repentance and faith
they seek admission, they submit and receive the new
rite that recognizes their membership, i.e., it was
during the time of their excommunication baptism
was instituted, and now when they enter the Church
they must enter as other Gentiles through Christian
baptism. Hence the members gathered in on the
day of Pentecost were added to a Church already
existing and composed of the 120 nr^jmbers whose
standing had been recognized long before, and which
had never been lost, and seeing they were never
outside of this one Church it was not necessary they
should undergo the rite of reception now.

In short, there has been only one Church on earth
existing under different dispensations. The God of
Abraham is the covenant God of his people still,
and all that Christ has done for the salvation of men
was done as much for those who were under the first
covenant (Heb. ix. 1$) as for us. There has been

i,:
111

CXE CHVRCir.

only one covenant or promise unto which the true
Israel have constantly looked. This is the turning
point of the whole question. As the blade, and ear,
and corn, are in the jarlier germ ; as the twig grows
into a tree ; or as the boy grows into the man, and
when he has reached man's estate is not a different
person from what he was when a boy, so tho Church
is one at different periods of her growth and history.
Infants were members of this Church once — they have
never been removed — therefore, they arc members
still, for the mere lapse of time works no change on
the characteristics and spiritual features of a Church
that liveth and abideth forever : all the rights of her
members are conserved.

INFANT CHURCH RELATIONS.

In the original constitution which God gave his
Church, infant children were included among its
members, as any one may see by a reference to the
facts of the case. And this membership of children
has never been withdrawn : there is no law of repeal
anywhere to be found in subsequent legislation, or
any change in this direction so much as hinted at :
the rights then granted have never been abrogated.
Therefore, infants have a right to membership still ;
and if to membership then surely to baptism, as the
sign and seal of the covenant which secures this right.

ONE CIIURCfL

By divine appointment children had a place given
them among the professed people of God, and this
arrangement, which embraced children among her
members, has never been changed ; those privileges,
then given, have never since been withheld ; nor has
the duty of parents in presenting their children to
the Lord been denied. The seed of the righteous are
still entitled to a place in the visible kingdom. Once
the covenant embraced both bel'leving parents and
their seed, and the seal of the covenant was applied
to both. If, therefore, such a change as the exclusion
of one half of the membership of the Church had
been effected, we might naturally have supposed that
some mention would have been made of the fact.
But we look in vain for any such indication. Instead
of this, we find numerous intimations showing that
the same order was to continue. Such a radical
change as this would imply would have been noticed
by both friend and foe. The Jews were proud of
their covenant relations, and would have offered
strenuous opposition to anj-- seeming encroachment
on their religious privileges. But we find not one
word of complaint against the exclusion of infants
from the membership of the Church ; because such
exclusion has never taken place, and children are
members of the Church still. Let them who say
this right has been withdrawn point out to us the

\ i IBB

ONE CHURCH.

say
the

abolishing act ! It is not to be found in all the Bible,
for the covenant which embraced infants was ex-
pressly called an everlasting covenant. And what
was once a law in the Church, and has never been
repealed, nnust be a law still. John Owen says,
" God never had a Church on the earth without
children being a part of it."

When proselytes were circumcised on a profession
of faith, and received among the people of God, their
children were received at the same time, and recognized
as members in the visible Church, So in the New
Testament, when parents were baptized their children
were baptized with them. In every case where the
head is known to have had a family, the house/ioid
was received and baptized ; i.e., the Apostles nevc
baptized the head of a home without baptizing all
its inmates, and receiving the whole family into the
Church, And I do not care to argue whether any
children were present in these households or not. It
is the 'brm of expression that is the determining
point. A household generally contains children, and
this term could never have been used if it had not
been customary for baptism to go by households, and
that the head of a home carried the religion of the
family with him, and when he believed, he believed
with all his house.

We might draw a parallel between the two ordi-

OATE CHURCH.

nances as administered under the two dispensations.
** When he was circumcised and his family." " When
he was baptized and his family." The one followed as
naturally as the other according to the tenor of the
covenant. " You and your seed." " You and your
children." Households were received into Christian
fellowship ill the New Testament Church, as in the
Old, on the faith of the head. And it is worthy of
notice that the Syriac version, one of the oldest and
very best versions ever made, translates the passage.
Acts xvi., 1 6, " When she was baptized and her
children.'' And the Coptic, another old version, gives
the same rendering. We maintain that the Lord, in
the New Testament Church, has made it both the
duty and privilege of Christian parents to consecrate
their children to Him through the ordinance of
baptism, as believing parents consecrated their
children in the Old Testament Church through the
ordinance of circumcision.

Our Lord's command in Matt, xxviii, 19, contains
these three elements: (i) Disciple the nations, (2)
Baptise them, (3) Teach them. And the Apostles,
acting under inspired authority, would continue to
disciple the nations as had always been done from
the beginning of the Church's history; and to include
the children along with their parents in the member-
ship of the Church, more especially as no hint of

ONE CHURCH.

a change had ever been given. Had the command
been, " Go and circumcise them," etc., there would not
have been a shadow of doubt on the subject as to
who were to be the proper subjects of circumcision,
as it had always been parents and children. But in
what sense is the case changed when baptism is
substituted for circumcision ? The Jews would never
imagine that the New Testament Church was to be
narrower and more exclusive than the Old had been.
And when they heard Peter urge them to come
forward and be baptized, for the promise was to
them and to their children, who would dream of
denying the right to infants? And when it was seen
that baptism had come in the place of circumcision,
the very instinct of the Jewish parent would prompt
him to bring his child for baptism, as he had been
accustomed to do for circumcision, and we find that
everything in the inspired record agrees with this
supposition. If children could be, and were, discipled
through the rilo of circumcision, why should they not
be discipled through the right of baptism ? No one
dreamt that the command to circumcise was meant
to exclude children, for the practice of the Church for
two thousand years would determine this point. And
yet the requirements for circumcision were the same
as for baptism ; for he who was circumcised was a
debtor to do the whole law. But the command to

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OA'/-: CHURCH.

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disciple and circumcise did not exclude children.
How then can it be shown that the command to
disciple and baptize necessarily excludes them ? The
fact is that noiv^ under the New Testament, as then^
under the Old, children are embrac' d within the
visible kingdom.

Before He was Himself conscious of it, the child
Jesus was, by the express wish and act of His paren*;s,
shut in by holy rites within the visible Church of
God ; and when He came to mature years He lovingly
took the place their faith had given Him, and grew up
zvithin the house of God, and not luithout, as, alas ! so
many of our young people do. The House of God
was a joy to Him, and never on any Sabbath was
His place seen to be empty. How thoroughly He
could appropriate David's words, " How amiable are
Thy tabernacles .... My soul longeth for the courts of
the Lord .... One day in Thy house is better than a
thousand."

It is, surely, a most impressive thought that
Christianity is thus seen bending over the cradle of
the infant, and claiming it for the Good Shepherd.
And how comforting and helpful to the faith and love
of the parents, that, when feeling their responsibility
and helplessness most, they can commit their charge
to Him, and plead the covenant mercies he has
promised to bestow ! The parent's heart is filled with

OXE CHUKCII.

gratitude to Him who allows his sacred name to be
named over them so early, and enables them to cast
their greatest care upon Him. Christ's care and love
for little children were wonaerful : " Suffer little
children to come unto me, and forbid them not."
What words of comfort from the lips of Christ! His
act in pressing them to His heart and fondling them
on His knee was intend. ' -^ mean all that the
strongest faith takes out of it. Wliile His reason
for His act is the most inspiring of all—" For of
such is the kingdom of heaven." As he took up one
after another, his right hand, disengaged, was laid
upon the little head of each, and He (giving the full
force of the original) fervently blesses them. Who
then can doubt the nature of the relation which the
Good Shepherd meant should ever exist between
Himself and the lambs of His flock .? To disfran-
chise them is to wrong the Saviour in His own house
and rob Him of half His charge-OF sucil is the

KINGDOM OF HEAVEN.

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THR CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

Suffer the little children to come unto me and forbid them not, for

of such is the kingdom of heaven And he took them up in his

arms, put his hands upon them, and blessed them. — Mark x. 14-16.

1.0, children are an heritage of the Lord. — Ps. cxxvii. 3.

Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child
shall in nowise enter iherein. — Luke xviii. 17.

He shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's
womb. — Luke i. 15.

From a little child thou hast known the holy scriptures^ which are
able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ
Jesus. — 2 Tim. iii. 15.

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thp: children of the church.

m not, for
up in his
. 14-16.

little child
s mother's

which are
s in Christ

One of the topics of discussion at a recent Sabbath
school convention was, " How to retain the older
scholars in the school and attach them peimanently
to the Church," The theme ihus suggested is one of
profound practical importance, and touches a weak
point in our modern Church life. It is, however, only
another way of stating. How best to promote the
growtJi in grace of our children, and the gradual
maturing of their Christian character, carrying out
the Apostle's command, and bringing them up in the
nurture and admonition of the Lord.

This is a question that appeals very directly to all
Christian people, and especially to those who are
engaged in the practical work of the Church. It is a
question of unspeakable moment to the young them-
selves which we seek to press upon their earnest
consideration, and we would ask them to ponder the
significance of the relation they sustain, and the
nature of Christian nurture under which they are
placed.

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CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

THE NATUKK OK CHRISTIAN NURTURE.
The settling of this question settles also the relation
which the children sustain to the Church, and to
Christ her Head. As to the nature of Christian
nurture, Paul's teaching is very explicit. He says,
" Bring them up in the nurture and admonition of
the Lord." Teach them that they are Jioly to the
Lord ; that they belong to Him ; and as members of
His Church, not living for future conversion, but
growing up Christian.^, and never knowing themselves
to be anythi.ig else. The Head of the Church makes
no provision for our growing up in sin, and living for
future adoption into the number of His people.
There is no specific arrangement, nor binding necessity
for our breaking loose from those tender, loving bonds
He throws around us in our infancy, and turning our
backs on Him who claims us as His own. A very
common opinion is, that, till such time as we get a
7ietv heart later in life, we are of the devil. And yet
is not the testimony of Scripture explicit that from
our childhood Christ claims our love and obedience?
There can be no doubt that the normal standard
of Christian life and growth is to be Christ's in our
infancy, as John the Baptist was, who was consecrated
to the Lord from his mother's womb ; to be His in
our boyhood, as Timothy was, who knew the Scriptures
from a little child ; and to be His in our whole life, as

Cini.DKEX OF THE CnUKCH.

Samuel, Simeon, Eunice, and the great majority of
all Christ's people, who have grown up, not as aliens,
but subjects of His grace, in harmony with the purpose
of our Lord, and the true nature of Christian culture.

We would put the question to all earnest children
of God and ask them which they would have preferred,
viz.: — to grow up in a life of sin and spend their best
days in alienation from the Saviour, and then, in the
evening, to find their way into the fold ? Or, to grow
up from childhood in the nurture of the Lord,
subjects of His grace all their days, never knowing
separation from His love, cen in infancy lambs of
His flock, having throughout life only the experiences
of God's children ? There can only be one answer as
to which of these two modes of growth is preferable
and most in accordance with the Scripture plan ; nor
can there be any question as to which of the two is
Christian nurture.

Nowhere is Christian character more beautiful, and
never are the fruits of our faith riper, than, when they
have matured through the long day of life under the
sunshine of our Father's love. It is a blessed thing
to feel that the superstructure of all our experiences
in grace have had their foundation principles laid in
a sanctified childhood ; that the blossoms and fruit of
our mature Christian life — mellow and ripe — have
their roots in the grace bestowed in our early years.

CIULDKEX Of THE CHURCH.

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And as the buds and blossoms of spring give promise
of the clustering fruits of autumn, so our baptized
childhood should b^ the earnest of the ingathering of
those sheaves on the great harvest-day amid the joy
of heaven. And this oneness of Christian life and
character from childhood onward is the special
promise of God to the faith of I lis people, and one of
the provisions of His covenant of grace. For this
end He has given the children a place in His Church,
and He has laid special obligations upon her con-
cerning them. " Feed my lambs ; bring them up in
the nurture of the Lord ; trai:i them in the way they
should go." He who said, " Suffer the little children
to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is
the kingdom of heaven," would never gather a flock
without lambs, or make provision for gathering the
flock away from the lambs. He who said, " Feed my
sheep," said also " Feed my lauibsl'' and heavy must
be the condemnation where this solemn duty is
neglected.

" It is no us'^ ^ our 'o-ying to be good till you have
got a new heart," SLid a Sabbath-school teacher to
a bright little girl in her class. But a child cannot,
and need not, understand this technical language, and
can have no conscious experience corresponding to
it. And the only inference that a child could draw
is — " that it is no use trying to be good till some-

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CUir.DREX OF THE ClfCKCH.

thing has happened, and been understood, above her
present aj^^e." Why then should she try ? The inten-
tion of such a teacher may be well meaning, but it is
both mistaken and cruel, and such teaching accounts
for many of the sad failures we see. Why not rather
seek to encourage the child to right feeling, and to
learn to love her Heavenly Father, as she has learned
to love her earthly ? And may not the Spirit bless
such teaching to the forming of right principles in
the heart of a child as in that of an adult ?

OUR AIM AND EXPECTATION.

If this be the place given to children — lambs of
the flock — and such the arrangements of Christ for
their Christian nurture, why then should the growth
of our children in Christian knowledge and experi-
ence be not only our aim, and earnest expectation
that these happy results will surely follow ; but
also our realized joy that cui children are found
walking in the truth and putting on one feature of
discipleship after another? And why are these expec-
tations, that have such Scripture warrant, so often
disappointed ? The Church would do well to ponder
the question, " How is it that so many who ought to
be in the Church, are to-day swelling the ranks of
sin ? " Is it not an inspiring thought that the seal of
the Spirit can be, and often has been, laid upon the

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life of a little child, as we are expressly told it was
laid in the case of John the Baptist ; and there was
nothing special in his case that makes it impossible
to be the privilege of children generally.

An eminent minister of New York was telling the
Rev. L. W. Bacon the story of his religious expe-
rience. Shortly after, Mr. Bacon met the venerable
father of his eminent friend. " Your son has been
telling me the story of his religious life." " Oh no,
he hasn't," replied the good old man : " he can't
remember that story. Only his mother and myself
can tell it. It goes back to his cradle." And so is it
in the case of thousands upon thousands ; the story
of their religious life " goes back to their cradle," and
they have been sanctified to the Lord from their
mother's womb.

Laying aside for a moment the consideration of
the divine side, viz., the purpose, relation and deal-
ings of Christ, let us look at the human, and even
then we affirm that a very young child can know the
Saviour and learn to love Him. Has God's Spirit
nothing to do in the hearts of children, no presidency
or power of grace there ? is this the only sphere from
which He is excluded ? The thought is monstrous !
True, a child's knowledge of Christ and its experi-
ences must be a chihts knowledge, very germinal and
imperfect, but not the less real on that account.

CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

Even adults are not saved because their faith is
strong and their experiences very mature, but because
Christ is rich in mercy, and His grace has availed
for them. And so we think of the safety of a lamb
chiefly because it is in the bosom of the Good Shep-
herd, who has His everlasting arms around it.

We ask, is this the place and character liiat the
Church usually gives her childien ? And do Christian
parents regard them as members of the visible Church,
and as such, holy to the Lord ? And is their growth
in grace the expectation commonly formed of them ?
And does their trcatmciit of them correspond to this
character attaching to them ? Or, are they not rather
looked upon as of the world growing up for future
conversion ? Do not the conception and treatment
of Christian parents in numberless instances practi-
cally place their children outside of God's covenant
mercies ? And have they not rather, by these false
methods and mistaken judgments, often trampled out
the first embers of faith smouldering in their hearts?
Have tliey been on the alert to welcome the first
indications of pious feeling? Have they not rather
by false tests, and by throwing a gloom over religious
life and duty, discouraged and alienated the young,,
and put obstacles in the way of their progress Christ-
ward ? It can never be a delightful thought to those
who are in covenant relation with the Saviour to

CUII.DREX OF THE CHi'RCH.

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think of their children as separated from them !
Themselves in the life-boat, but their little ones sink-
ing in the sea, with the prospect of only one here and
there being saved ! No, the promise, that is to us and
to our children, puts both within the covenant, and it
is our privilege as it ought to be our unspeakable
joy, to regard our children as the Lord's heritage, and
never to regard them as anything else than His, till
they, by an after wicked life, persisted in, force us to
change our judgment of them. I regard my children
as belonging to the Lord now, and I will never believe
anything else of them till I cannot help it

There are those who put tlieir children outside of
the Church and of God's covenant mercies, and who
class them all as children of the devil. And the more
earnest these parents are, the more will they ponder
the question, '* Will God in the exercise of His
sovereign grace ever convert my child and bring him
into the fold, or will he remain a child of the devil
for ever ? God's wrath and curse are upon its httle
soul to-day, will they abide till the day of final doom ?"
To think thus of my child would han^^ the weight of
death around my heart, and compel me to live in the
most terrible of all uncertainties ! But we have not
so learned Christ, who has taught us to regard our
children as the lambs of His flock, as in His church
and among His people ; and as such, holy to the

CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

Lord, growing up in His nurture and for His King-
dom ; and nothing short of an abandoned after-life
can rob us of this hope and joy. And O what a
multitude of sins it would cover, if parents and the
trainers of the young, would deepen these precious
truths in the hearts and lives of the children of the
Church !

THE CHRISTIAN HOME.

VVe must guard against that extreme individualism
which is so prominent a feature of modern religious
life, to the ignoring of those organic laws which bind
all society together. The State, the Church, the con-
gregation, the family, are all founded on organic
conditions. In the home the child lies within the
moral agency of the parents for years, and never
wholly escapes it. The connection is so close as to
lead us to believe that the faith and Christian life of
the parent will become those of the child ; and that
'f we live a Christian life before them, and fill our

v, le with a Christian atmosphere, the law of the
ip.rit of life will include our children along with our-
selves.*

In the matter of religion the heads of a home carry
their children with them. (This I hope to show in
the next chapter). And in any change of religion the
children are involved with their parents. Hence the

* See on this point lUishnell's "Christian Nurture."

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CUILDKEiY OF THE CHURCH.

form of language, " He rejoiced in God ivitli all his
house.'' The hojne is the church of childhood, and no
school of training can take the place of that great
university of nature, the Christian home, where the
mother is the chief professor, whose lessons and influ-
ence go deeper than any they will meet afterwards.
In this school grace may dawn in the hearts of the
young, in other and milder forms of experience than
in those cases of conscious conversion from a life of
sin ; and the former case is as much dependent upon,
and a manifestation of the Spirit's working as the
latter, and is the normal growth of Christian life and
character. We do not affirm that every child that
is so trained will grow up in grace ; but simply that
this is the true ideal and aim of Christian culture, and
that if the conditions were fulfilled, the failures would
be far fewer than many suppose. Many godly parents
have wayward children, just because many godly
parents are foolish, and manifest many weak traits of
character. They work under false ideas, by v/rong
methods, and exhibit a harsh, forbidding manner
sufficient to account for all the failures we deplore.

Where we make our home and our churches schools
of early Christian nurture ; pray and work, teach and
expect our children to grow as plants in the house of
the Lord, not one in ten will fall away, nor yet be
able to remember a time when they became Christian,

CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

for they liave nev-er been anything else. They hav';
grown into their Christian Hfe as they grew into their
maturity. As a matter of fact, children have been
so trained : this, indeed, is the normal condition, and
not exceptional, l^axter tells us, that, at one period
of his life, he was greatly distressed because he could
not recollect a time when any special, gracious change
had taken place in him. He had been taught to
expect a crisis, and a great decisive struggle, resulting
in his conversion. And because this never came he
imagined something must be wrong ; " Till I learned
to know," to use his own words, " that education is
as properly a means of grace as preaching." And he
tells us he lived to thank God that he had learned to
love and obey God so early, and had been led into
the richer experiences of the Divine life, as he had
been led into his physical and mental stature, by the
uniform law of growth and gradual development.
Spurgeon says, that of all he has admitted into the
Church in childhood, he has not found one, who, in
after life disgraced the Christian profession. And
the uniform experience of every pastor is, that his
own young people who have been trained in his
Sabbath-school and Bible-class, are the most mature
and helpful Christians, and those who will give him
the least trouble, or cause the least anxiety.

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CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

NORMAL (JKOWTII.

It has been said that " The value, if not the possi-
bility, of true Christian feeling, inwrought by the
Holy Spirit, and developed gradually from childhood
by Christian nurture, ana concurrently with our
intellectual growth, is too often lost sight of even
among good people. The Christian life is generally
so developed, so gradually moulded, as sometimes to
preclude distinct statements of any time when our
eyes were opened." The light from the Saviour's
face came upon the soul as the morning comes — so
gradually that no man can mark the moment when
the first beams burst forth, yet so efficiently that none
can doubt its presence. From a little germ beneath
the soil our flowers and fruit bloom and ripen through
the long summer day, slowly, yet surely, with the
sacred progress which Nature manifests. And so is
it with the plants which our Father has planted in
His own garden amid the sunshine and glory of His
day of grace. The life of a young disciple often
ripens in a way that prevents us from mapping out
the manner or order of its progress in the soul, but
none, not even we ourselves, can doubt its reality.
None of us can remember the day we were born, or
when a new existence began that is to continue for-
ever ; far less can anyone describe the experience of
the beginning of those years through which we have

CllILDREX OF THE CHURCH.

lived. Nor can the great majority tell the day they
were born of the Spirit, or describe the beginning of
Y\{z in the soul ; and yet it may be no less real in the
one case than in the other.

This fact is with many unduly ignored, and alto-
gether underrated as a practical question, to the injury
of Christ's people, and especially the most tender and
humble of His flock. Require of every disciple an
exposition of the manner of his spiritual awakening
as a proof that he is Christ's, and you discourage
many of His best people, and unnecessarily and
dangerously imbue others with misconceptions con-
cerning the whole subject. By this mechanical regu-
lation, which Christ Himself never imposed, and by
a false ideal of what some call Christian experience,
we too often put without the fold the lambs of the
flock ; we put them so far without, that immense
numbers of them are lost, past all recovery, on the
dark mountains of sin.

Have you ever seen the unveiling of a statue, on
some public occasion, before a great multitude?
When, at the given signal, the nicely adjusted cover-
ing was dropped, it seemed as if it had sprung into
being at that very moment. But all know, and none
better than the sculptor, how long and how painfully
he has laboured to shape its beauty out of the rude
mass at the beginning. So is it with the image of

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Cl/rrj)REN OF IIIE CHURCH.

Christ within us. Most are trained from their infancy
into the Christian life, so that when the disclosure
comes, it is not the revelation of something that has
newly taken place, but more like the unveiling of a
statue on some public square, a revelation of something
that has been there for a length of time. To some it
seems as if it had sprung into being then and there,
while in reality it has been the work of the chisel
and the mallet for months and years, under the
fashioning power of the Spirit of God. The disclo-
sure was sudden, but the foundation and workman-
ship were not. " A child that is of a devout and
loving nature, brought up at the knee of a devout
and loving mother, is early inclined to God, and it is
so trained in the nurture and admonition of the Lord
that it never knows and never ought to know, the
time when it did not think of God as its Heavenly
Father, and of belonging to Christ." A child brought
up in this way grows year by year, and step by step,
and becomes an earnest Christian, and no one, not
even himself, can tell precisely when the change came.
Our Christian character to-day is the outcome and
result of all that has gone before, and we have been
shaped and moulded by all the influences, ten thou-
sand in number, that have touched us. Unnumbered
drops have fallen on the ground, you cannot tell
where ; but, as the result, the fields are green. You

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CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

see them, and rejoice in the fact. So it is with our
hearts beneath the dew of heaven. ** The wind
bloweth," etc.

When I was being licensed by the Presbytery of
Toronto to preach the Gospel, an incident which I
may relate occurred that illustrates this part of our
subject. I had been examined on the usual subjects,
Latin, Greek, Theology, etc., and now the subject of
personal religion was announced, and this was en-
trusted to an elder who had hitherto taken no part in
the examinations. And he, like an earnest, devout man,
wishing to go to the root of the matter at once, asked
me, " Do you think you have ever been converted ? "
To this I replied, that, according to his understand-
ing of the matter, I did not think I ever had been.
This answer seemed for a moment to bar my way in
the good man's judgment, till a member of the court
came to my relief, and framed a question which I
could answer easily ; but I am sure the elder had
grave doubts about me. I never put the question
" Have you been converted ? " to my young people
who have grown up within the Church, been reli-
giously trained, and have all along been giving
evidences that they were growing in grace and in the
knowledge of Christ Jesus. When such seek full
communion with the Church, i look over their whole
past life, with all ics attendant circumstances, and if

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CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

convinced of the sincerity of their desire to obey
Christ, and of their interest in Him, though that
interest may be imperfectly spoken, I would never
dream of troubling them with a question that does
not apply to them. Our Master would not break the
bruised reed, but tenderly nou.ished into greater
strength the beginnings of faith, and so must we.
By their fruits ye shall know them ; for the Spirit, by
the fruits which He produces, makes His presence
manifest wherever He resides.

BAPTIZED CHILDREN ARE MEMBERS OF THE
CHURCH TO BE TRAINED FOR CHRIST.

The great majority of believers are regenerated in
infancy, and what is often regarded ^s their after
conversion is only the blossoming out into fuller
manifestation of a life received from above, long
before. The church membership of children is put
in clear, forcible terms by Dr. Atwater who says : —
" They should be taught to feel, act and live as
becomes those who are the Lord's ; not merely that
it is wrong and perilous to be and do otherwise, which
is true of all, whc.ncr within or without the Church,
but that such a course is inconsistent with their posi-
tion as members of the visible Church, placed in it
by the merc)' o{ God, and bound to His service by
vows made for them by their parents, whose duty

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CIIIL INE/V OF THE CHURCH.

and privilege it was thus to act for them, and give
them a place among the people of God until they
became competent- in their own persons, and of their
own choice to act, cither to retain or renounce it."
Dr. J. W. Alexander says " Children born within the
pale of the visible Church, and dedicated to God in
baptism, are to be taught to hate sin, to fear God, to
obey the Lord Jesus Christ. And when they arrive
at years of discretion, it behoves every one of them
to consider the duty of ratifying the vows made in
their name by a personal avowal of allegiance to
Christ. The case of such is, therefore, widely dif-
ferent from that of the world without."

Hence the propriety of the position laid down in
" The Directory for Public Worship," which says,
" Children born within the pale of the visible Church,
and dedicated to the Lord in baptism, when they
come to years of discretion, if they be free from
scandal, appear sober and steady, and have sufficient
knowledge to discern the Lord's body, ought to be
informed that it is their duty and privilege to come
to the table of the Lord." And the Supper is not
offered, as a medal is given, for superior merit, but as
a means of grace to help the feeble and timid on
their way. ■ -

How many of our young people really understand
their true relation to Christ and His people, as being

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CHILDREN 01' TIL CIIUKCIL

members of His Church from birth ? Does the Church
herself ordinarily regard these little ones and all the
young people growing up under her care as members
or as ivorldlings ? The theory which is expressed in
our symbolic books is Scriptural, but our present
practice is very inconsistent, and our official language
quite misleading. We speak of the young and treat
them as being of the world, and when they apply for
sealing ordinances it is called ''joining the Chiirchl'
instead of assuming their full responsibilities and
advancing in their privilege. There is a little book
by Rev. Alexander Balloch Grosart, called " Joining
the Churcl>." It is dedicated to Rev. Andrew
Bonar, and is intended as a guide to the minister m
his dealings with intending young communicants.
In his opening remarks he says " I suppose the appli-
cant to have called upon the minister and to have
expressed a wish to 'join the Church' " And at his
first visit the applicant is made to say " You will re-
member, sir, that I wish to 'join the CJuircJi! " This
language is most misleading, and a Free Church
minister ought to have known better than to use it
in this connection, A man does not join his country
when he comes of age and casts his first vote, nor,
again, do our young people join the Church when
they come for the first time to the table of the Lord.
They are members of the Church by birthright, and

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their peril is in breakitij^ away from, and not in seekinpf
closer union. Let no Presbyterian ever be so false
to his principles as to speak of joining the Church
with reference to the young. Such language fails to
make manifest and emphasize the Church member-
ship o{ children.*

Some say this makes our Church membership rest
on natural descent and not on the work of the Spirit.
But if God has given the child that relation and
standing, and promised to bless them to the child's en-
lightenment ; if He has said that lie both can and
will own parental instruction to th child's growth in
grace, it is derogatory to God's wisdom and goodness
to doubt this. If God says that the child's coiuicction
with the visible Church will be to him the school of
Christ, where he will be taught saving truth, and grow
up a member of the Church invisible, why should any
one doubt this, and act as if God would not keep
His promise? We greatly dishonour God when we
doubt His word, and we injure ourselves and our
children when we change the plans of His grace.

HOW THE CHURCH MUST INCREASE.
There are those who, by periodical revivals, gather
in her members, and their actions imply that only in

• A call is said to be signed by so many members and adherents ;
this language is open to the same objection.

.US

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this way, by conquests from the world, can she grow.
But while admitting this as one way, we must not
seek to live by conquest only, but by internal growth ;
and the lon^fer the Church is established the more
prominent will this feature become. Hitherto we
have too much forgotten this latter and normal mode
of growth, and expected only the former. Our piety
is fiery and spasmodic. We think of the Church as
besieged, and occasionally making sallies upon the
enemy. We try \.o get up revivals. AH true revivals
come down. We expect the Church to grow \>y
conquest, and overlook the Tp.ct that its chief increase
is from ijitJiin and hy growth. We think nothing is
being done unless we have stir, excitement, multiplied
instrumentalities, and elaborate machinery. We seek
to be pious and devoted on certain great occasions,
and forget that the chief fund of increase is in the
bosom of the Church herself, and that the longer she
is established conversions from the world will become
less and less frequent, and growth yn grace more and
mqre realized and rejoiced in. When children are
trained up in the way they should go, they swell the
ranks of the Church as her chief element of increase.
Not till religion comes into the home will it thoroughly
permeate the life. This principle is so evident and
Scriptural, that in the Confessions of the four great
historic Churches — Sreek, Latin, Lutheran, and Re-

CHILDREN OF THE CHUKCH.

formed — the children of Christians are spoken of as
members of the visible Church with their parent —
" AD who profess the true religion togetlier zvith their
childre:i.

Steady growth in all the elements of Christian life
and progress; additions at every communion from the
older scholars in the Sabbath school and Bible
classes; t'le Lord adding daily such as shall be saved ;
fruitful results from the ordinary means of grace,
nothing unusual or special, but all life and spiritual
movement, and the young daily learning to walk in
the truth and living to adorn the doctrine of God
their Saviour in all things — let no congregation grow
weary with such evident visitations of the Spirit as
these, or long for any other proof of a revival. This
is the way the Church grows, firmly knit together in
the bonds of love. We heard once of a complaint
being made against a certain congregation that it
had never had a revival of religion for forty years.
While others, it was said, had enjoyed an outpouring
of the Spirit every winter, this particular congregation
had remained unvisited. Yet the objector went on to
say: "We must admit that the attendance keeps
large, and the number of its communicants has con-
tinually and steadily mcreased ; all the people seem
devout, sincere, and active in the work of the Lord.
Few congregations have shown the same liberality, or

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CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

taken a more active part in every good work ; their
contributions to missions have exceeded all others,
they have kept thoroughly organized, and everyone
seems to be at his post, and to be doing his work
faithfully. There have been no special conversions,
and yet the young people and children of the Church
have, naturally, and very generally, stepped into the
place of their fathers. There has always been a
wonderful degree of moral force about the congrega-
tion, that has leavened the con.munity." Such was
the testimony borne in regard to it, and yet in the
face of all this, it was said this congregation had not
been blessed by a revival of religion. But, surely, this
is the kind of revival we work and pray for, and long
to see — a continued, gracious outpouring of God's
Spirit on every meeting and through all the agencies.
A revival that keeps every one at his post and doing
his work earnestly : this is, indeed, the true type of
Christian advancement. Such a congregation as this
is a model for all others, and one after our own heart.
What an honour to be the minister of such a congre-
gation as this ; not a passing by, but an abiding ; not
a temporary shower, but a ceaseless out-pouring ;
God's Spirit so obviously owning the work as to keep
the ranks filled ; the people zealous, liberal, devout,
with the lambs of the flock abiding in the fold, and
drinking the sincere milk of the Word. What other

CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.

or clearer proof than this does the Church need of
God's gracious presence, and the Spirit's reviving
power? Instead of regarding such congregations as
unvisited, or deprived of quickening grace, because
there has been nothing spasmodic or unusual, we find
in all this the proof that the revival has been continu-
ous, and we take such congregations as the true type
of Church life- and spiritual growth. Such a condi-
tion of things should never be deprecated, as it is the
normal growth of the Church. O that the Spirit may-
be poured out on each service, and continue His loving
kindness to us, that we may grow as trees planted by
the rivers of water !

SPIRITUAL LIFE AND PROGRESS.

It is our common regret that so many of our young
people grow up and fail to take their places at the
table of the Lord, or even in the Church, a course
contrary to what we might expect naturally to follow
religious home training. Many of the young count
themselves out, and take the place and assume the
character of strangers to the covenant of promise.
This sad tendency is helped in part by a wrong mode
of representation Lhat I cannot help thinking is very
hurtful, and it is used by many who ought to know
better. They speak, as I have said, of the young as
"joining the Church," and represent it as an introduc-
Hon to, instead of an advancement in, their spiritual life,

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and taking the place that of right belongs to them as
children of the Church. Our children, and the young
people of our Christian homes, ought to be taught and
made to feel that they are members of the visible
Church of Christ by birthright, and have been
recognized by baptism. From their childhood they
have been under the laws of His house, and their
peril is in breaking away and not in seeking closer
union. As this is the place Christ has given Ihem,
and such their corresponding responsibilities, why is
it that we do not more frequently see the young of
our Sabbath schools and Bible-classes pass into the
full membership of the Church ? It is, I am persuaded
due largely to false ideas and false teaching on this
subject, and the young are treated as being outside
covenant relations, and in no sense different from the
heathen. But to put forth such a view is to pour
contempt on one of our fundamental positions. It is
just here where all churches fail in their mission, and
lose their hold on the young. It should be the anxious
care and constant aim of the Church that the blessing
of Christ may come upon her young, that our sons
may be as plants, grown up in their youth, and our
daughters as cornerstones, polished after the simili-
tude of a palace ; and nothing less than progress in
spiritual life should satisfy those who are sowing the
good seed of the kingdom.

THK FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

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Come thou and aU thy house into the ark, for thee have I seen
righteous before me in this generation. — Gen. vii., I.

For I know him that he will command his children and his house-
hold after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice
and judgment, that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he
hath spoken of him. — Gen. xviii., 19.

And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the
heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth
with a curse. — Mai. iv., 6.

I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they shall be my
people. — Jer. xxxi., i.

Else were your children unclean, but now are tliey holy.—

I Cor. vii., 14.

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THE FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

No man liveth to himself ; we are so placed together
in life that we necessarily affect one another. If we
fall, others are pulled down with us, and if we rise, we
help to lift up those with whom we are associated.
More especially is this the case in the family^ where
the head of the home can do so much either to make
or mar it ; the sins of the fathers being visited on
their children to the third and fourth generation,
while their faith follows thousands of them that love
God and keep His commandments. The sin and
neglect of the parents carry the children away from
God, and forfeit their standing and privileges before
Him ; while the faith of the parents brings the
children near to God.

THE REPRESENTATIVE PRINCIPLE.

This is one of the commonplaces in theology.
God has, in His all-wise and merciful arrangements,
made the standing of the child in civil, social, and
sacred things, to depend upon that of the parent.

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Every covenant which God has made with man has
included the cliild with the parent, and it has been
the divine purpose to deal with \\\g family rather than
with individuals ; e.g.^ in the Covenant of Works with
Adam, when life was promised on condition of
obedience, Adam represented his posterity. *' The
covenant being made with Adam, not only for him-
self, but for his posterity all mankind descending
from him by ordinary generation, sinned in him^
and fell with him in his first transgression." So
also in the Covenant of Grace through a Redeemer^
Christ represented His people, and acted for them ;
and the same principle of representation runs through
every subsequent renewal and unfolding of that cove-
nant. In the covenant of protection made with Noah,,
his posterity are included, *' And God spake unto
Noah and his sons saying, And I, behold I establish
my covenant with you, and \v\\X\ your seed after you^''
etc., Gen. ix. 9-17. Of this covenant the bow in the
cloud was the sign and seal to him and his posterity
that God would never again destroy the earth with a
flood. It is the same principle of parents representing
their children that is contained in the Covenant of
Grace made with Abraham, " And I will establish
my covenant between me and thee, and thy seed after
thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant
to be a God unto thee, and to tJiy seed after thee'''

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FAMILIES OF THE CIIUA'CII.

Gen. xvii., 7. And in the renewal of the same cove-
nant with Israel through Moses, even the little chil-
dren are included ; it is still the same principle of
''you and your seedy " Ye stand this day, all of you,
before the Lord your God ; your captains of your
tribes, your elders and your officers, with all the men
of lsva.c\, your little oties, your wives, and the stranger
that is in thy camp, from the hewer of wood unto the
drawer of water, that thou shouldst enter into the
covenant with the Lord thy God, and into the oath
which the Lord thy God maketh with thee this day,
that He may establish thee to-day for a people unto
Himself, and that He may be unto thee a God, as
He hath said unto thee and as He hath sworn unto
thy fathers, to Abraham, to ^saac and to Jacob."
Deut. xxix., 10-13. And in the opening sermon of
the New Testament dispensation, when the Church
was remodelled — not instituted — the same gracious
principle is proclaimed, " The promise is to you and
to your children." Acts ii., 39. "Suffer the little
children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for
of such is the kingdom of heaven." Matt. xix. 14.
While on the ground of this established principle and
permanent relationship the solemn injunction of the
Master to His Church is, '' Feed my lambs."

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PARENTS AND CHILDRExV.

The former represent and include the latter. In the
Old Testament the terms were, '''yon and your seed'' ;
and in the New Testament, wliich is tlie same church
visited, comforted and purified, the terms are, ^^ you
and your children^ And this principle is the key-note
of the Bible on this subject. In all His gracious deal-
ings God has included children and brought them
along with their parents within the scope of His pro-
mise. When His people of old stood before the
mount to enter into covenant with Him, theii' little ones
were there also to be included, and to enjoy the privi-
leges with their parents. When God gave laws to
His people, they were in the most solemn manner
commanded to teach them diligently to their children.
When the new dispensation was introduced and the
Church took its New Testament form, the same
principle was announced : " Of such is the kingdom
of heaven ;" the same great truth is declared : it is
still '^ you and your children^ When the head of a
home was circumcised on a profession of faith and
received among the professed people of God, their
children were received at the same time and counted
members. So when parents were baptized their
houseJiolds were baptized with them, in every instance
where children were known to exist. And wherever
gospel duties are enjoined, and the worship of the

FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

true God enforced, children arc always included.
They are always spoken of, and spoken to, as belong-
ing to the Church, and so far as outward relationship
and visible membership are concerned, as being
Christians. Paul addresses his letter to the saints
which arc at Ephesus, and among those saints he
includes children. " Children obey your parents in
the Lord : for this is right. Honour thy father and
mother ; that it may be well with thee, and thou
mayest live long on the earth," etc. — Eph. vi. 1-3. It
is still ''you and your c/ii/drefi."

Our children are subjects of the British natiiMi as
much as we are, protected in common with ourselves
by the whole power of the law. They arc growing
up to assume the whole responsibilities, and to enjo\'
all the privileges of their citizenship, though as yet
they are only minors. So a^'e the children of believ-
ing parents members of the commonwealth of Israel
through God's covenant incorporating them into His
visible kingdom, with a view to their religious train-
ing for His spiritual and eternal kingdom ; that when
they grow up they may assume all the responsibilities
and rejoice in all the privileges of loyal subjects to
the grace of Christ their King, related not merely to
the external Church, but members of the Church in-
visible, having their names written in the Lamb's
Book of Life. So in the Christian home the head

FAMILIES OF THE CIIURCII.

carries the members with it, and a parent's faith
changes the character and relationship of that home ;
brings the family under Christian training and in-
fluence ; gives it new hopes and new joys ; and covers
it with the promises of salvation. From being a
Jewish or a pagan household, the parent's faith in
Christ changed it into a Christian home.

THE HOUSEHOLD COVENANT.

We have evidence of this tri'ih in the answer which
Paul gave to the question, so earnestly asked of him
by the jailor : " What must I do to be saved ? Be-
lieve on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be
saved, and thy house." All readily acquiesce in the
first part of the answer, viz., that personal faith in a
personal Saviour would save the soul. But when it
is further affirmed that his , ith would save his hotise
as well as himself ; that it would bring \\\s family i\\ong
with him into covenant relations with the Saviour,
then some doubt the doctrine, while others deny it
utterly. Yet this is the affirmation that Paul makes,
that the father's faith would save botli Jiimself and J lis
house.

When the apostle declared that the house would be
saved by the faith of its Jiead, he did not mean to say
— nor is this what he did say — that the jailor's faith
would save his family in the same way as himself

FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

Neither is it a proper undcrstandirif^ of this passage
to say that all he meant was, that the same way of
salvation was open to his family that was open to
him ; and that if they believed they would be saved
as he would be saved ; that their faith would save
them, as his faith had saved him. To take this view
is to miss the force of the apostle's statement It is
not a satisfactory explanation to say that all that was
meant was that salvation was open to his family on
the very same terms that it was open to its head,
" The same way open to them as to him." — Alford.
This would declare nothing as being peculiar, or of
special benefit, to them. If this were all, then were
these children not one whit advantaged by the faith
and Christian life of the father ; for in this sense sal-
vation was open to all the Philippians, and, indeed, to
the whole human race. But when Paul says, the
faith of the father will save the Jiousehold, it is of the
Household Covenant the apostle speaks, according to
the original promise, " / ivill be a God to thee, and to
■thy seed after thee ; that covenant, according to whose
terms my faith makes God to be not only my God,
but also the God of my home and of my family.
The faith of the jailor would bring his household dAou^
with himself into covenant relations with God ; it
would give it a new character ; from being a pagan,
it would now become a Christian home ; it would

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MILIES OF THE CHURCH.

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confer on all the children the advantages and privileges
of a household of faith ; it would cover it with a new
light and glory ; it would breathe around it a new
atmosphere, and confer new duties ; it would bring
tne home within the range of the Church of Christ
according to the Abrahamic Covenant, and secure for
the children the nurture and admonition oi the Lord,
In short, it ivould save the house, so that the children
would grow up uixler Christian influences, which God
has promised to bless to the salvation of our children.
Hence all the other members were at once baptized on
the faith of the father, and along with him. It was
to be in the new dispensation, as in the old, the father's
faith carried the children with him, and they were to be
baptized and incorporated into the Church, as formerly
the children of p'oselytes to the Jewish faith had
always been.

It was so on tiie ground of this same covenant
relation between parents and children — the head and
its members — that Lydia's household was baptized.
The Lord opened her heart ; she believed and was
baptiz'^d and received into the Church. And on the
ground of her professed faith, which gave her a right
to bring her child t-en to the Lord, they were baptized
and received into the Christian Church along with their
mother. God receives His people as households,
" For the promise is to you, and to your children."

FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

When Zacchreus, at the call of the Master, came
down to receive the Lord at his house, the Jioiiie was
made a partaker of his salvation, and of all his new-
born privileges. That day salvation came to /lis house ;
not merely to himself, but to his children. His
receiving the Lord gave his home new relations, new
privileges, new duties and new responsibilities ; it
became clothed in a new character, and was brought
within the scope of the divine promises. His chil-
dren would henceforth be committed to his way of
life, and be made partakers of the father's hopes and
joys. He would now bring them up in the nurture
and admonition of the Lord, that they might be made
partakers of a like precious faith with himself, and be
recognized by God as the seed of the righteous.

God blesses the children for the father's sake :
" Thee have I seen righteous, go thou and thy whole
house into the ark." Not the righteous alone, but
the seed of the righteous are to be blessed. The ark
in which the parent is to be saved is meant for the
family. Every Christian parent ought to live as if
the ark and its salvation were meant by God for both
themselves and their children. There is room in the
ark for your child as well as for yourself, and you
must train your families to live as those who have
been separated from the world and are in the ark of
safety.

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Did not the pascal lamb, like God's own lamb, aim
at the deliverance of families ? Not persons but
houses were sprinkled and saved. He smites the
Egyptians and passed over the houses of Israel.
Christ's blood to-day is to be sprinkled on our
homes — it is still "a lamb for a house." And let it
not be forgotten that each father sprinkled it on his
ov/n house, and thus saved both himself and his
family, while the child of the Egyptian was involved
in the unbelief of the father, and perished with him.
God's promise is definite, let the parent's faith take
hold of it, and like Abraham, not stagger at the pro-
mise through unbelief, confident that what God has
l)romiscd he is able to perform. " Thou and thy
seed." " Ye and your children." " Thou and thy
house." " Thou and thy son." " As for me and my
house," etc., such is the link binding father and child
together in the divine arrangement.

THE FAMILY — THE UNIT OF CHURCH LIFE.

In this representative principle which we have been
illustrating, there is nothing peculiar to the Church.
The relation and standing of the child along with its
parents are only what is common in every other sphere.
In the most vital instances the standing of the
parent is the standing of the child, and the act of the
parents is the act of the child. If the parent becomes

FAMILIES OF THE CIIURCIL

a British subject, so do his children ; if he cross
the Hnes and take the oath of allegiance, his children
become subjects of the United Stales. Even without
the household covenant of God's gracious dealings
the parents must naturally, and of necessity, carry
their children with them in the course which they
pursue, whether that course be good or bad. If I am
a pagan, then my children are brought up pagans ; if
a Mohammedan, then they grow up Mohammedans ;
if a Mormon, then my children arc 'committed to that
gross system ; there is no help for them ; and if a
Roman Catholic, they are trained as Roman Catholics ;
whatever branch of the Protestant faith I profess, my
children are trained in the same. If I am an earnest
and loving disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, my first
care — as in the case of Lydia — will be for those who
are dependent upon me that thv?y too may grow up in
the fear of the Lord, and the promise is — a promise I
take home to my heart — thai ve shall all be bound
together as a faniilv in the bundle of life. In all
these instances it is still '^You and your children'^
How then can any par^ 'it neglect this great salvation,
when he sees his family so seriously involved in the
consequences of his life and conduct, committed, in
fact, to his course ?

Some say this makes membership in the Church
come as a matter of course, and not of grace. We

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are told the cases are not parallel between the Church
and the world, and membership in the Church and citi -
zenship in an earthly kin<jdom. We are born into the
latter by natural birth, and all so born are, as a matter
of course, subjects of the nation. But with the king-
dom of Christ or Church it is different ; here we must
be born of the Spirit. " Except ye be born again, '^
John iii., 7. We must have His grace realized in our
hearts to make us members of His Church, and we
have no right to receive any as members of the
Church till we can receive from them this evidence of
regeneration. Such is the teaching of .some, but we
believe it to be unscriptural and partial ; it looks at
one side of a subject, which obviously has two sides.
If true, it would exclude children, who, though they
were subjects of grace from their birth, could not give
ustheproof of it. It is necessary also to remember the
distinction between the Asiblc and invisible Church.
Membership in the former does not in all cases
depend upon actual faith. As far as adults are con-
cerned, they are received on 2^ profession of faith, and
this is all they can give, or the Church receive from
them — a credible profession justified by a correspond-
ing conduct. It was this test alone that Christ required,
or allows any of his servants to demand ; while the
Church membership of infants depends on that of
their parents. They are along with their parents

FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

members of God's visible kingdom which embraces
believers and their seed, and, in consequence of their
being members of the visible Church, the Seal of the
covenant is to be applied to them in our day, as it
was applied to Abraham's seed since his day.

There is an organic connection between parents
and children, such, that the former not merely repr*^-
sent the latter, but the child lives within the moral
sphere of the parent whose life and influence flows
into the child many years after its birth, even as the
sap flows into the branches from the trunk. The
connection, in short, is such as to make it easy of
belief that the faith and Christian life of the one will
be propagated in the other. We do not so much
think of Christians as Jiavi7ig households, as of Chris-
tian households in which the father stands surety for
his child before the Lord, as Judah, when pleading
before the Governor of Egypt, said he stood surety
to his father for Benjamin. — " I am surety for the
lad."

YOU AND YOUR SEED — YOU AND YOUR CHILDREN.

God sets us together in His Church as families.

We ask consideration of the first sermon preached
in the Church under its New Testament form by
Peter on the day of Pentecost. That morning, when
the sun rose, the constitution of the Church as in-

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eluding infant members, was, as it had always been.
If any change is to be effected, now is the time to
make it. Jewish parents had all along been accus-
tomed to regard their children as being with them in
the Church ; they did so that morning on the day of
Pentecost. Will any intimation of a change be given
before the day closes, or any new regulations that
.shall from this time forth exclude children ? Will
Peter in his first sermon say anything that will make
parents feel that their children will be in a worse
position now than before, or even in any different
position ? Or will his words be a sweet assurance to
them that their children will continue to occupy the
same place, and enjoy the same privileges in the
Church ? " For the promise is unto you and your
children^ Acts ii., 39.

" You a7id your seed'' had been the terms of the
covenant all along ; Peter, now in his first sermon,
says they are to be the terms of the covenant still.
"'You and your children' together in the Church
now as you have always been." As Jews, their chil-
dren had been always associated with them in the
same privileges and blessings in the Church, and if
they had to be deprived of these now, it is strange
that the old covenant relation should be spoken of
in this way. True, the language of the Apostle does
not enjoin the baptism of infants, or even refer

FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

directly to baptism. But it overthrows the notion
that the children of believers are in a less favored
position now, than they were under the old dispensa-
tion. If his words have any meaning, they do mean
that the covenant of God with His people is to remain
unchanged in this respect, and still to include infants
with their parents. " You and your cJiildrenl' were
the explicit terms of both. Besides, the New Testa-
ment Church is distinguished from the Old by its
extension of privilege and not by its curtailment.
And it would be passing strange if the faith of the
parent in Christ would have the effect of cutting the
child off from his Church, and leaving it outside and
in a worse position than in a Church of more circum-
scribed privileges.

There is only one way in which the Jews could
understand Peter's language, viz., that children would
continue to hold, along with their parents, the same
membership in the New Testament Church that they
had done under the Old. And could you conceive of
Peter, this holy man of God, speaking as he was
moved by the Holy Ghost, using such language at
the beginning of the Gospel, employing the very ex-
pression that would of necessity convey this idea,
when he knew that, now, children were to have no
relation to the Church whatever ? If they were to be
cast out, surely some explanation of the fact was

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FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

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necessary. For two thousand years, "j'oii and your
seed'' meant both together in the Church of God ;
but now, ^'yoH and your seed'' means parents and
children are to be separated from each other in that
same Church ! Who can beUeve such a thing? Surely
Peter's words at the commencement of the New
Testament dispensation would be misleading if the
status of children was not to be the same then as it
had always been. If any change of relation had been
contemplated, the Church would have been made
aware of it. But there is no notice of a change, no
complaint from any quarter, which would have been
made if children had to be deprived of a privilege they
had enjoyed all along in the Church. But instead
of this, Peter declares that now, as formerly, the
promise would still include both ''^ you and your seed!'
" Were this idea of the import of infant baptism
intelligently and faithfully carried out in the practical
government of families and churches, we believe the
amount of baptized apostacy would be greatly dimin-
ished ; that piety among parents and children would
not only be more widely diffused, but more complete,
elevated and symmetrical, as a vital force penetrating
all the relations of life ; that the spectacle of devout
men, fearing God with all their house would be as
frequent as it is delightful ; that the Church would
be ensured perpetually, and increase not merely by

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external conquest and aggregation, but by internal
growth, in the multiplication of those happy families
of which we can say : ' liehold how good and how
pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.
There, the Lord hath commanded II is blessing, even
life for evermore.' Such a cheering faith is warranted
by the promises of God, which are none the less true,
though our unbelief fails to realize them," {Princeton
Revieiv.)

EVILS OF A CONTRARY IJELIEK.

Christian parents too often fail to take a clear and
strong hold of the covenant of God made with them
and their children, God's precious covenant — -the
sure mercies of David — on which we profess to
rest when offering our children to God in baptism,
dwindles, too frequently, into a mere ceremonial
observance ; the performing of a mere rite ; it may
be the giving of a name to the child ; or at best an
irksome duty. After consecrating our dear little ones
to the Lord, calling them by His name, and commit-
ting them to His holy care, we still take for granted
they are not His, and act on this supposition. We
do not expect they will grow up in grace, but, as un-
converted, they will grow up in sin, as children of the
devil, till such time as they may chance to come
under conviction and be b

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FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

them as aliens, we treat tliem as aliens, and in this
way we lead them to believe themselves to be aliens,
and they soon learn to accept the place and character
we give them through our unbelief. By our false
treatment of them we put them outside of the king-
dom, and make their return all but an impossibility.
There is nothing more unscriptural, and, consequentl)^
nothing more hurtful to the Christian growth of our
children than to teach them that they are not of the
Church, but of the world. And nothing tends more
powerfully to make them what we call them, than
their disfranchisement from tli {"amily of God. If
these are the unhallowed influences under which our
families arc growing up, when they come to maturity,
the more serious of them will stand aloof, waiting, as
it were, for God to enlist them ; waiting for some
mysterious call, some miraculous unfolding, some
undefined influence to come upon them, some super-
natural invitation given them to come in and take
their place ; instead of feeling — and acting on the
feeling — that all along they have been under law to
Christ, included as members in his visible Church,
and held to Him by the tenderest and holiest of all
ties ; and that all their life long every blessed con-
sideration unites to urge them to give themselves
up to Christ at once, and know that they belong to
Him as the Seed of the Righteous.

FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

THE HOME, THE NURSERY 01- THE CHURCH.
We must magnify \.\\c faffiily in our ministry, and
emphasize what is in great danger of being forgotten
at the ptesei.t time. We have dwelt on individual
responsibility so long, the relation, duties, power and
capacity of the unit, till we begin to feel that the
individual is the exclusive unit of society and of the
Church of God. But the Lord makes much of the
family and of home life. He binds together parents
and children in holy, tender bonds, so that the head
saves the members. And thus, under the divine
arrangement, one Christian generation produces
another ; faith is the root of faith, and the Church of
the future is carried in the bowels of the Church of
to-day. His offers of mercy run thus : " Believe on
the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved a?id
thy house." A strong Church is made up of well-
ordered families, where Christian fathers and mothers
bring up their children in the nurture and admonition
of the Lord ; where the home of the week has its
counterpart in the home of the Sabbath. Such a
home is the Church's true nursery, where the young
men and maidens are glad when it is said to them :
" Let us go into the house of the Lord." A home
where the atmosphere is pure, where the plants grow
under the fostering care of a bright and blessed influ-
ence, where the purity and peace of Christian nurture

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FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH.

come in as the benediction of heaven on the oponing^
minds of the j'oung, and is to them the type and
prophecy of an eternal Sabbatli, and of our home
above.

What is the prevailing tone and sentiment of your
home? Tell me this, and I will tell you the future of
your children. Is the atmosphere surrounding it clear
and healthy, or murky and full of miasma? Is the
tone frivolous, mean, worldly, low ? Is there a sad
lack of savour and sweetness — the something better
and higher? Or is your home warm, loving, true;
refreshing and winsome as a May morning? Do
father and mother show the children they are living
for God ? Then the future of your children is manifest,
for blessed is that home that is in such a case.

A WORD TO THE HEADS OF THE HOME.

It is well to remember that it is in the recurring
duties of each day where you exert your power, and
breathe a fragrance around the life of your children,
that will influence them all their days. It is not so
much the discharge of technical duties either, as the
spirit you manifest — your own life lived before them
— that tells on the training and destiny of your home.
Your children will copy your example, rather than obey
your precept.

Don't forget that for some years you stand in God's

FAMILIES OF THE CHURCH,

stead to them, and can do much cither to mar or
make them. And no one can take the place, or do
the work of a parent, or relieve you of your home
duties. Sabbath-schools are only Jiclps, not substi-
tutes. Home training! what may it not accomplish
under God for your child ? What fruits may it not
produce? But if you are not faithful to your solemn
charge, what evils may not result from your neglect ?

And see what care you bestow on other things of
far less consequence than the godly upbringing of
your offspring! How much time and pains you
spend on training a vine to climb upward on the
proper supports ! What interest you take in your
favourite plants, shrubs, or the flowers in your conser-
vatory ! How diligently and constantly you watch
them, water them, prune them, protect them at nights
against frosts ! What a large share of your care and
even affection they enlist !

But with how much greater zeal and loving earnest-
ness should you watch over and train the olive plants
in the nursery of your own home, that they may
become the trees of righteousness, and grow up goodly
cedars in the garden of God ! Great must be the
blame attaching to those parents whose neglect of
duty is the occasion of their children's ruin. Keep
constantly before them the scriptural model of Chris-
tian nurture, viz., that children are not only capable

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Families of the church.

of, but often are subjects of grace from their mother's
womb; and their life-long steps have daily brought
them nearer to the mountain of the Lord's house — a
true growth in practical godliness. Teach your
children these blessed truths in the bright days of
their childhood. Tell them in the morning of life,
that Christ requires them to be His, that the true
place for the lambs is the fold of the Shepherd's love.
Treat them as belonging to Christ, speak of, and to
them as bearing this character ; make clear to their
understanding and heart their place, their responsi-
bilties, and duties to their Saviour, and this will be
one of the most efficient means to make them what
you long to have them to become. And your
encouragements are great, for the Lord loves to hear,
and is so ready to grant the requests of father and
mother when pleading with Him for those whom
He pressed to His bosom, and claimed to be His
own. — Mark v. 22, 35, Matt. xv. 21.

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THE CARE AND NURTURE OF THE

CHURCH.

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Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligenlly, lest thou
forget the thinj^'s which thine eyes have seen and lest they depart from
thine heart all the days of thy life ; but teach them thy sons, and th"
sons' sons. — Deut. iv. 9.

And that they may teach their children. — Deut, iv. 10.

And ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath ; but bring them
up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. — Eph. vi. 4.

Take this child away and nurse it for me and I will give thee thy
wages. — Ex. ii. 9.

And al! thy children shall be taught of the Lord ; and great shall
be the peace of thy children. — Ps. liv. 13.

THE CARE AND NURTURE OF THE

CHURCH.

If we are to judi^e of the importance of early
Christian training from the frequency with which it is
enforced in the Bible, and the very earnest way it is
spoken of, we must conclude that the subject is pro-
foundly important, and involves consequences of
transcendent interest, not only to the young them-
selves, or the Church of which they are members, but
also to society at large. Both the Church and the
world are concerned in the nurture of the young in
the paths of virtue. Upon this question turn, directly
and immediately, the character and welfare of society.
Its strength and safety must be built on this founda-
tion. The atmosphere which we daily breathe will
be pure and healthful, or tainted with the miasma of
sin, according as the children are trained in sin or in
the way they should go.

As a prominent subject of divine teaching, the dis-
cussion of this theme is always timely. VVe would
therefore speak a few words of hope and cheer, of

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

t* %

counsel and warning, that all teachers and trainers of
the young may be encouraged in their works of faith
and labours of love. There is the more need of
calling attention to this matter at the present time,
for many instructors — parents in their homes, and
teachers in the Sabbath school — have false notions of
Christian nurture, of their own responsibilities, the
far-reaching consequences and enduring character of
their work. And if any are led to take hold with a
firmer hand, or a truer purpose in their heart, with
more dependence on the Great Teacher, our labour
will not have been in vain.

WE MUST BEGIN EARLY.

With great wisdom it is said, ''Train tip a CHILD."
Begin early and preoccupy '^he soil and sow it with
the precious seed of the Word. Gather the children
into the fold as the lambs of the flock, that they may
be safe within these sacred enclosures. Teach them
their plr>.ce and privilege and duty, show them that
Christ's claim is very tender and precious, and seek
to draw out their affections toward Him. A very
little child can understand the love of Christ through
the love of its own mother, and, gathered in His
bosom, they can learn to iove Him.

To every rejecting, devout mmd, there is not a
more interesting object of contempntion than a littk

CAKE AXD NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

child, whose frail bark has just begun to cross the
mighty deeps of life's stormy sea. There is not a
more critical period of life into which are gathered
the very germs that determine the whole growth of
the future. Even in that sleeping, unconscious, help-
less babe, there are slumbering the elements of a
greatness that partakes of the infinite, and a being
has begun that knows no ending. That little child
shall live when the heavens have grown old and
weary, either in the light of our Father's face, or else
estranged forever from the sweetness and glory of
His home. And this alternative depends largely on
the early training and nurture of that child.

When we see the buds of spring open, we can tell
what they will become. The acorn can on!}- grow
into an oak. Your seeds and plants can only blossom
into the flowers of the year — very beautiful, but of
short duration. And yet how anxious you are
regarding them ? You watch them with interest, you
water them, you weed them, you train them, you prune
and support them if necessary. Many a mother
takes great pains with her house plants, while her
children are utterly neglected to grow up in wild
confusion. Many a father has his thoughts on his
business, in his office, or on some subject of study
from morning to night, while his son is running
uncared for on the streets. "If 1 had my life to live

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C^/?/^' ^/.VZ? NURTURE OF THE CIIURCIL

over again," said a wealthy merchant, " my relations
to my sons would be very different from what they
have been. Probably I would make less money, but
they and I would not be such strangers to each other."
We watch and care for things that cannot grow
beyond our expectation, but chc child is uncared for
whose future is in our hands, and who may become,
according as we are faithful or remiss, either an
adoring angel before the throne, or an outcast from
that holy presence. The possibilities that are wrapped
up in the breast of that little child are unspeakable.
Yet a little, and reason shall light up that countenance,
and irradiate that dull, sleepy eye ! Yet a little, a d
passion shall sweep across that unconscious bosom !
Yet a little, and its likes and dislikes, its enmity or
fond affection, its upward or downward tendencies will
reveal themselves. There \s sublimity in the thought
of a child's expanding powers, the little vessel pre-
paring to weigh anchor and cross the miglify deeps
of life ! Shall it be s\ afted into /he realr/is of bliss —
the harbour of all safety? Or, losing its moorings,
will it be cast adrift on the hazardous sea of vice, and
go down a wreck amid the wild surges ? Children
often play amid pitfalls hidden by flowers, and there
is danger when the sky may be all sunshine ; and
hence the need of greater watchfulness, of tender,
loving care, and the true nurture of the )'oung. And

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C^A'£ AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH,

God has made the relation between parent and child
to be so close — the child lying within the sphere of
the moral life of the parents — that no other being is
so dependent, so easily led or influenced. The mind
of a child is as plastic as clay, ready to be moulded
into any shape; sensitive like the photographer's plate,
ready to take any impression ; pliant and unsuspecting,
waiting to be drawn out toward good or evil. Who,
then, can over-estimate the influence for good or evil
that every parent has over the life and destiny of
each child ?

%h^]N IMPRESSION.S LASTING.

The imprfcss//>//s made in childhood, and the in-
structions then imparted, the habits formed in youth,
and principles then adopted, gnnv into the very tex-
ture and constitution of the tuture man or woman,
ai//) become marked with all the rigidity and enduring
nature of an original instinct. Childhood is the period
of training, and every child will be trained in either
one way or another from the period of earliest infancy.
You can change the direction of a stream, if you touch
it at its source : of a tree, \{ you bend the twig : of a
nuin, if you mould the child. It has become a proverb,.
'\Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined^ And that
bend will be seen when it has attained its full stature
and then it will defy the power of man to change it.

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CAKE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

Ill • '

You sometimes hear the question put — " How can
Roman Catholics possibly believe all the absurdities
that their creed contains?" "How can intelligent
men assent to those miserable legends and old wives'
fables ? " One reason is that they begin early, and
train their children in the dogmas of their faith.
They understand the influence and enduring nature
of youthful impressions, and apply this principle to
their advantage. Rome wisely brings her influence
to bear upon the young, and is most solicitous to
secure the teaching of her own children that she may
train them in the rites and practices of her faith ; and
in this respect she sets the whole Christian world a
noble example of zeal and earnestness which may
well shame many self-satisfied, lazy, indifferent Pro-
testants slumbering in the thick folds of their
orthodoxy.

The true subjects of the Church's training are
children. If she is to do her work and fulfil her
great mission she must begin early, and pour religious
light and influence into the young mind and around
the opening affections of the heart, and she will learn
the truth of the saying, " 7Vie Child is father of the
Matt." In the great majority of cases, as the child is,
so shall the man be : the temperament and character
of the one are carried forward into the other. And
far more likely now than at any future period will im-

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

pressions be made, and principles imparted, that will
determine the life. As the soft, moistened clay by
the water's edge, which takes and retains any foot-
mark from every passer by ; so is the soft, impressible
nature of our children to every outward influence that
meets them. Now is the time to work, before the
habits of vice have been formed, and evil rooted in
the heart. In childhood you can far more easily
engage the affections, and lead them by pure motives,
than when their hearts have become hardened and
bronzed in guilt. There is no creature so much at the
mercy of another as a child with his parents. There
is nothing so much under their power as their own
children. During the first years of life the parents
are in the place of God to them. There is no one so
wise, so good, or so great as father and mother to the
children who love them, and they will go to them for
the explanation of all mysteries, the solving of all
questions, the allaying of all fears, and the a.ssuaging
of all their sorrows. Parents, betray not your trust.
You can either train up children in the way they
should go, or poison the fountain of their early life
from which a bitter stream will ever flow.

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CARE AND NURTURE OF TlfE CHURCH.

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THERE MUST BE BOTH TEACHING AND
TRAINING.

True Christian nurture always involves these two
elements — viz., teaching and training. It is highly
desirable not only to have a right object in view, but
also correct methods by which the end may be gained.
Erroneous principles are adopted on this point, if we
may judge from the common practices in the bringing
up of the young. Teachers in our schools regard
their work as consisting wholly in the mere imparting
of information, giving their pupils a knowledge of
the subjects of study — grammar, arithmetic, history,
English, etc., etc. And the teachers in our Sabbath-
schools, and parents in their homes, follow the same
plan, and are content with teaching bare Bible facts,
or the mere repetitions of verses, hymns, or the
questions of the Catechism. They labour wholly in
the region of the intellect, and, in consequence, their
work often becomes mechanical, with no sympathy or
religious impulse in it. But if a teacher is to accom-
plish anything, his work must be living work, with
heart and soul in it, and all his labours must be
inspired by love. Let no one put his hand to this
work without being prepared to offer the strongest
emotions and richest services of both mind and heart.
Parents and teachers of the young must not regard
their work as merely intellectual and appealing to

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C/1A£ AA'D NUR'IUKL OF 7 HE CliUKCJL

tlie understanding alone, through the bare facts of
doctrine or technical les >n. To aim of every
instructor must be to mould the heart as well as to
enlighten the mind. His work is pre-eminently moral
and spiritual work, ahd it must be kept in mind that
the young have souls capable of knowing God. and a
mere increase of knowledge without the moulding of
the life is not sufficient to fill up all that is meant by
Christian nurture.

Too limited a meaning is given to the expression —
religious education. With man)' the prominent idea
is teaching, and we would not say a word to detract
from its value ; but mere teaching is not enough.
There must be training, and these two functions are
quite distinct. Education usually calls up in our mind
a vision of books and lessons, of masters and study.
And no doubt knowledge is an important part of
education, and that man does good service who either
points out the knowledge that is most valuable, or
determines the best methods of securing it. So, also,
in religious education the imparting of Gospel truth
is fundamental. But even Gospel truth is only a
means to an end, to secure the culture of the heart
in righ'-ousness.

To tCi-^Ji is to communicate knowledge : to train is
to establish habits of mind and heart,, till these become
a part of the life — eas>', natural, and necessary. The

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C/i/v'i? AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

essence of teaching is making another to kitoiu, but
the essence of training is leading another to do :
teaching fills the mind, and training shapes the
character: teaching brings a child into new spheres
of information, and training shapes his habits of life.
These two must go hand in hand in the bringing up
of the children in the nurture and admonition of the
Lord. And as a matter of fact the training has begun
long before the teaching. To teach a child duty is to
show him what is right ; to train him up in duty is to
lead him to do what is right ; constraining to the
right side, not by outward authority, but by establish-
ing moral tastes and habits in the soul. In the open-
ing years of childhood we do not so much inculcate
doctrines as seek to make the young know right from
wrong, and lead them to hate evil and love what is
good. We do not speak to them of conversion — the
new heart, the need of faith in the atonement. But
we tell them of Christ and his love for little children ;
that he took the little children in his arms and blessed
them, because they were so dear to him. Above ail,
you set an embodiment of the Gospel before them in
your own life. Mere children cannot understand the
technicalities of doctrine, or of adult Christian experi-
ence, but they can understand you when you tell
them that God loves them, and that the Saviour came ,
to take care of them and keep them as His own.

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CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

They can be trained to feel and to know the differ-
ence bet\veen a right and a wrong act.

From parents and teachers far more is demanded
than mere teaching — the imparting of knowledge.
Our work must be viewed rather on the moral and
spiritual side. As the minds of the young expand,
and the affections of thoi«- hearts begin to open out,
it must be our aim to surround them with all gracious
influences, and to drop into the fresh soil the seeds rf
truth, to take root and grow, and result in a rich har-
vest v)f precious fruit. But we cannot train our
children unless they see the goodness and sweetness
of our life, the trust and obedience of our heart, and
the life of faith lived before them. ^n short, the
Gospel must t)c embodied before them in concrete
form, and then through methods that are often silent
as the spheres of heaven, through ways that are im-
perceptible, yet all-powerful, the young may be led to
a knowledge of God's love and grow up in His grace.

We must be earnest, simple, and sincere ourselves,
and then our life will be an element of grace, and
surround them with the warm, genial atmosphere of
love, which will be to them as the sunshine to the
opening buds of spring. It is just here, where so
many of us fail. We profess enough, even to the
borders of ostentation. We bustle, and command,
and punish, and make noise enough. Our lives are

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C^//'^ ^A'Z? NURTURE OF THE L/IURCH.

decided and richly coloured, but, like autumn leaves,
they have no fragrance. We make everything harsh
and technical, with no sweet, balmy influences to woo
their hearts, and lead the young to the Saviour. We
may be orthodox in our creed, sincere in our pro-
fession, strong in our faith, and earnest in our pur-
pose, and yet lack those particular features and
elements of character which are captivating to the
young. The people thronged Jesus, because there
was a spell about him that drew them, and many of
them were won over by the force of its beauty. A
harsh, severe, cold manner chills ; and through the
false medium of our lives the young get gloomy, dis-
torted views of religion, and are repelled. A life like
his, and filled with the Spirit of the Gospel, is the
great agency. For a child can understand a life when
it cannot comprehend a doctrine.

THE END IN VIEW.
The aim of all Christian education is so clearly
stated in the Word of God, that we often wonder
why so many hr.ve mistaken notions in regard to it.
Children are to be trained up in *' the way they should
goy Not in the way they wish to go : not in the way
that many, alas \ do go : but in the way they should
go, and in which, if parents were more faithful, the
great majority zvould go. Paul's language on this

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this

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

subject is very explicit. He says : " Bring them up
in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." The
great aim of all religious training, never to be lost
sight of for one day, or during a single lesson, is to
wake up in the hearts of the young a sense of the
Saviour's claim upon them, and lead them to him,
that from their infancy he may guide their feet in the
way of peace. In all our instruction, whether in the
home or in the Sabbath-school, we must never look
at any lower mark, or set before us any lower motive,
so that our teaching and training may gather around
this central purpose. '

There is a false impression on this subject that has
worked much evil in the Church, and, if not speedily
corrected, will work much more. The notion is gene-
rally entertained that the object of family training, or
of Sabbath-school instruction, is merely to impart so
much knowledge of the Bible, to explain abstract
points of doctrine, leaving it to have an after effect.
We do not expect present fruit, for the spiritual life
of the young is something future. We have sown the
seed, but must wait for a future day for results, for
their conversion cannot be till they have reached the
years of maturity, or at least advanced so far as to
enable God to give them a new heart.

This belief forms the public policy of certain
Churches, who have revival times, when men and

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women are converted and join the church, and begin
a Christian life. And none but converted adults ever
join ; all the children and young are of the devil — •
unconverted and unsaved ! In these Churches the
young can be taught, only for future conversion. And
will any one explain how it is that so few conversions
ever happen under the ordinary services, but generally
<it protracted meetings ? But while this is the avowed
policy and practical working of certain Churches, yet
the latent feeling of many who ought to know better
is, that their children must grow up in sin and be
subjects of future conversion. But where is the
ground for this theory ? Or from what Scripture
authority is it derived ? Why class those who have
grown up in our Christian homes as heathen ? Or
why expect no other return from our Sabbath-schools
than from the masses of unbelief? Is Christian nur-
ture nothing different from that which is not Christian ?
Can children not be brought up in the nurture of the
Lord, and did Paul enjoin an impossible thing when
he commanded it ? And when Scripture says, "Train
up a child in the way he should go," necessity is laid
upon us to train him up in sin, which is surely the
way in which he should not go ? The Churches must
change front ; and get on Scriptural ground, and
believe — and act on the belief — that children can

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

grow in grace, and in the knowledge of the Lord
Jesus Christ.

Bushnell, in his admirable little book on " Christian
Nurture," says : " The aim. effort, and expectation
should be, not as is commonly assumed, that the child
is to grow up in sin, to be converted after he comes
to a mature age , but that he is to open on the world
as one that is spiritually renewed, not remembering
the time when he went through a technical experience,
but seeming rather to have loved what is good from

his earliest years There is no absurdity in

supposing that children are to grow up in Christ. On
the other hand, if there is no absurdity there is a very
clear moral incongruity in setting up a contrary sup-
position to be the aim of a system of Christian educa-
tion. There could not be a worse or more baleful
implication given to a child than that he is to reject
God and all holy principles till he has come to a
mature age. What authority have you from Scripture
to tell your child, or by any sign to show him, that
you do not expect him truly to love and obey God
till after he has spent whole years in hatred and

wrong Children have been so trained as

never to remember the time when they began to be

religious The Moravian brethren give as

ripe and graceful an exhibition of piety as any body
of Christians living on earth, and it is the radical dis-

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tinction of their system that it rests its power on
Christian education. They make their churches
schools of holy nurture to childhood, and expect
their children to grow up there as plants in the house
of the Lord. Accordingly, it is affirmed that not one
in ten of the members of that Church recollects any

time when he began to be religious Don't

teach your children they are unconverted. Many put
their children on the precise footing of heathen' and
take it for granted that they are to be converted in
the same manner. But they ought not to be in the
same condition as heathens. Brought up in their
society, under their example, baptized into their faith
and upon the ground of it, and bosomed in their
prayers, there ought to be seeds of gracious character
already planted in them ; so that no conversion is
necessary, but only the development of a new life
already begun. Why should parents cast away their
privilege and count their children still as aliens from
God's mercies " ?

THE POSSIBILITY OF EARLY DISCIPLESHIP.

We read in the Bible, " Believe and be baptized."
And as baptism is our reception into the Church, and
as infants cannot believe, they should not be baptized,
and therefore there is no place for the n in the Church.
Such is the doleful conclusion drawn from this cruel

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

logic. But it is also said, " Believe and be saved.'
And since the want of faith excludes children from
baptism, it must exclude them from salvation, by the
same logic. For there is a far closer connection
between faith and salvation than between a profession
of faith and baptism. The explanation is that neither
in the one case nor in the other are children referred
to, but only those to whom the Gospel was preached,
and who were in a position to believe and profess it.

Strange as it may seem, there are those who, while
giving children their proper place in the world, in
society, in school, in the home, and even in the love
of their hearts, give them no place in the Church of
Christ. The parents live within, and the children
remain without. The Church folds the sheep, but
turns her back on the lambs, and leaves them in the
wilderness. The Good Shepherd shuts the father and
mother in, and the little children out, and forbids
them to come in, though that same Shepherd has
said, " Of such is the kingdom of heaven : suffer the
little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not."
Some still persist in forbidding them, and shut out the
multitudes whom He has given a place among His
people, as He did Timothy, from the day of his birth.
Many people think Christ can be a Saviour of grown
up people only, and children and youth are aliens
from His divine mercy ! Before I could believe this,

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CAA'E AND NURTURE OF 77 fE CHURCH.

Heaven and licll must change places. Bushnell again
says: "Christ is a Saviour bound by no such narrow
and meagre theories — a Saviour for infants and
children and youth, as truly as for adult age ; gather-
ing them all into Mis fold together, there to be kept
and nourished together, by gifts appropriate to their
years, even as He has shown us so convincingly, by
passing through all ages and stages of life Himself,
and giving us, in that manner, to see that He partakes
the wants and joins Himself to the fallen state of
each. Having been a child Himself, who can imagine,
even for a moment, that He has no place in His fold
for the fit reception of childhood " ? A Methodist
minister once, in language more forcible than elegant,
said, " There are only two places in all the Universe
where there are no children — Hell and the Baptist
Chitrck."

But I am well aware that many are better than
their creed, and that their practical treatment of
children goes far to do away with the evils of their
abstract principles. Others, again, do not know the
full import of what they profess to believe, and go on
training their children for Christ, bringing them up in
the nurture and admonition of the Lord, though their
creed, logically interpreted, classes them as aliens and
outcasts. I saw this illustrated some years ago very
conclusively. I had visited a Sabbath school which

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CIIURCIf.

was known to be very efficient. I found a fine class
of pupils — bright, intelligent, obedient, well taught
and trained ; I was much pleased and said so, and
spoke of them, and to them, as the children of the
Church — the lambs of the flock. Afterwards I was
a guest in that minister's house. He had four fine
children, who were a joy to their parents. They, too,
were bright, intelligent, and well trained : it was, in
short, a home of love and peace, and of tne fear of
the Lord.

When with the father alone I remarked, " What
delightful children ; what a great pity they are all the
children of the devil, and that even your own dear
lambs are amongst them " ! He looked at me in
amazement, and with something of horror in his face.
" Why are you so startled," I asked. " Does not your
Church demand from all her young who join her to
tell ivhen and hozv they were converted, and they all
do so. Does not every candidate for your ministry
tell when he was converted. What were they before
they were converted if they use the word in any
Scriptural sense? And these little children have not
yet had this experience, and, as unconverted, they
must be all children of wrath : and is that the feeling
you have toward your own children " ? *' Well," he
replied, " I never thought of that ; it does seem con-
trary to one's natural feeling." " And what is more,"

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CA/^E AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH,

I answered, " it is contrary to the most explicit teach-
ing of Scripture." VVc then sat down and tallied
over many of the points I have discussed in this
volume. The result was that this minister almost
immediately changed his view on the whole relation
of children to the Church, and ni a short time he
changed his Church relations. He is nou" in heaven
and finds many children there, as he had before found
out that they ought to be in the Church here.

We lose much by not expecting enough, while in
another sense we expect too much. If our children
are disciples, we think they must be as we are our-
selves ; we vv^ill not concede to them the child-life,
germinal, weak, fitful, up or down, according to the
feeling of the hour. And yet the grand, radical idea
around which all our efforts should gather, our prayers
and expectations rest, is this — that the young who are
trained up in the School of Christ are to grow up
Christians, and never know themselves as having been
anything else. The Holy Spirit can work when and
where he pleases, and can set up his kingdom in the
heart of a child where the faculties are opening out
to apprehensions of right and wrong, as well as where
the heart has been steeped for years in sin. We must
not teach the young that they have to grow up aliens
first and then be consciously converted, and pass
through a technical experience of conviction, repent-

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CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

ancc, and conversion to God. The great majority of
all who are His dear children have, like Samuel, the
Baptist, and Timothy, been consecrated to the Lord
from their infancy. And to teach the necessity of
tnese experiences in every case would bring the cloud
of gloom and despondency over what is now radiant
in the light of a spiritual sunshine.

The Holy Spirit often claims the heart as the seat
of his grace from the dawn of life, and causes the
light of his presence to shine forth more and more
unto the perfect day. This is not only in harmony
with the teaching of Scripture, but should be expected
as the result of thei; privileges as the children of
believing parents, and as the direct fruits of the place
that has been given them in the Church of God. Like
the opening buds of spring which are bathed by the
dews and light of heaven, why not expect that the
mind and heart of our children should also open
into the love and grace of God, and grow up as
tender plants in His garden, to shed a fuller fragrance
from the fruits of their faith as they expand into
maturer life.

The smallest child in the Sabb?.th school is a fit
subject of the Spirit's presence and renewing grace.
Yea, the infant in its mother's arms may be claimed
and sealed by him, and this should be our confident
hope, which will become the chief motive power in all

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Christian nurture. Don't count them out till they
learn to count themselves out. But show them their
place, make them feel Christ's claims, point out their
•duty, and v^hat is expected of them ; wake up in
thei.' conscience a sense of their responsibility, and
that now, in maturer life, as the result of all they have
been taught to believe, they must take the vows upon
themselves which have been taken on their behalf
We must show them that nothing stands between
them and their full enjoyment as members of the
Church of Christ, save what they themselves are im-
posing, and that they are only adding sin to sin by
.refusing to comply with what their past privileges
invoive and the claims of Christ have always indicated.
Why may not the Holy Spirit claim the whole life,
from birth to death, as well as any part of it ? And
what He can do, we have abundant evidence that He
usually does in the case of those who have enjoyed an
early Ch"istian nurture. Therefore, in ihe majority
of these cases it is theologically false to say that unless
a youth has had experiences of deep conviction of sin,
has been appalled by the terrors of the law, and has
had a conscious experience of conversion, he cannot
be a Christian, x^nd in the case of many who imagine
they have had this experience, it is only the blossom-
ing out into actuality of latent germs, like the leaven,
which was hidden for a time in the meal. Much
important growth is below the surface.

If:

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

THE PERMANENCE OF THIS WORK.

" Sic transit gloria inundil' is written on the
escutcheon of this world's fame, its honour, wealthy
rank, and influence. How evanescent are the things
that prove attractive to the carnal eye ! How short-
lived and jnsatisfactory is much for which we live
and toil ! Mr 's pathway on the earth is marked at
every step witn many abortive efforts, and much that
he does is in the sand — the next change will wipe it
out. But when we work for the Lord, our labour is
never in vain ; an! nowhere does it yield richer or
more permanent results than when we labour in the
hearts and affections of the young.

God's Word tells us that if children are trained
up in the way they should go, when they are old they
will not depart from it. The promise is explicit, and
is a definite assu»"ance as to the future of our children.
Care and early training in childhood secures their
stability in manhood. The meaning of this promise
has not been taken advantage of, and, in consequence,
parents are robbed of much of their comfort. Accord-
ing to this promise, wc are not merely to pray for, but
confidently to expect that our children will grow up
baptized by the Holy Ghost, as well as baptized with
water, having not only an intellectual knowledge of
the Gospel, but also enjoying the grace of the Gospel :
jrowing up as believers and knowing only the experi-

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€nce of those who have grown up in the nurture and
admonition of the Lord, and who can sav, " O Lord,
Thou hast been nay trust from my youth up."

How necessary and vital is early Christian training !
And in the great majority of cases it is the germ out
of which the future religious life expands. And when,
in humble dependence on the Holy Spirit, the seed is
sown in infant hearts, it usually takej root where the
home is earnest and warm with the love of Christ.
And if the fruit does not appear immediately, how
often it is seen to appear after many days ! There are
many sad exceptions, no doubt, but it is equally true
that an explanation could be given of most of these.
The noblest structures of Christian manhood have had
their foundations laid in infancy and childhood. Those
trees of righteousness which flourish with such beauty
and strength have their roots far back. And much
that is seen on the surface to-day has been preparing
and growing from early impressions in the home,
where we have the holiest altars, the wisest and best
teachers, the tenderest love, the sweetest graces, and
the most lasting influences.

When Christ was giving instruction to Peter concern-
ing the future welfare of His Church, the lambs were as
much in His heart as the sheep^ for together they formed
tiiat flock which He loves to lead through the green
pastures. " Feed my lambs " is just as binding on the

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

under-shepherds as " Feed my sheep." So we must
tend and feed them for the Shepherd's sake, as well
as for their own.

How much depends on early relijjious impressions !
We believe that none ever get wholly beyond their
reach. They have held many a tempest-tossed bark,
and brought it through the storm safely into the har-
bour. And when the young are brought to the
Saviour early, a multitude of sins are covered, and
the young shun those sad years of estrangement from
God, which must ever remain as a dreary waste in
their life.

The importance of early Christian training may be
seen in the case of Timothy, whose father was a
Greek and probably an unbeliever, but whose mother
lived in the hope and joy of the Gospel. She made
the training of her son a subject of prayerful, constant
care, and taught her boy to know the Scriptures from
his youth. And when he grew up to manhood, and
was himself put in charge of the Gospel as a minister,
Paul enjoins him to remember what he had been
taught ; to fall back on the rich memories of his boy-
hood, and never to forget what he had lea» ned at his
mother's knee, but continue in the godly way she
had set him. " But continue thou in the things which
thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing
of whom thou hast learned them." (2 Tim. iii : 14.)

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C^^-ff ^7VZ> NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

There must have been a wonderful sweetness and
power in these home-memories for young Timothy,
and a great strengthening for his future work ; since
he had known in his childhood those Scriptures, which
now, in the prime and force of his manhood, he
went forth to proclaim, leading men to the Saviour
whom he had learned to love so early, that they
might have a like precious faith with himself. And
we are confident that, in loving remembrance of
that home and all he had learned in it, he would
be most anxious that the children and the young
of his charge should be trained as he had been,
and taught the same great truths that had brought
gladness to his own soul.

" And just so it will ever be true of the ripest and
tallest of God's saints who were trained by His truth
in their childhood, that, however deep in their intelli-
gence or high in spiritual attainments they have grown
to be, the motherly and fatherly word is v/orking in
them still, and is, in fact, the core of all spiritual
understanding in their character" — Christian Nurture.

Nor need we complain that it takes long to perfect
some virtues, and that training the young is slow
work : if slow, it is precious, and the results are worth
waiting for. Provided the fruits are good, do not
complain of the time. We look out into the garden
in the spring-time, and see crocuses, May-flowers, dew-

CARE AND NURTURE OF THE CHURCH.

drops coming quickly to perfection. The apple, pear,
or peach trees take longer to mature. Other trees
require centuries to come to perfection. So, also, those
graces and virtues in the life of man that are most
durable and precious ripen slowly, and cost us much.
But they are all of permanent value, — not a leaf shall
wither. He who plants a flower on a sand-bank does
a good work ; but he who causes truth and righteous-
ness and the fear of the Lord to spring up in the
heart is a co-worker with God, and is causing the
moral wastes to blossom as the rose.

And what has simply budded here shall bloom and
brighten eternally in the Garden of God, where no
frosts nip the tender buds. See that blooming shrub,
how it grows beneath the sun's quickening light !
How wonderfully everything is freshened beneath his
warm and tempered rays ! So the growth of the soul
in all knowledge and virtue comes from the quicken-
ing of that Sun of Righteousness. When His warm
beam penetrates the heart, then sunshine and summer
have come into the soul. The growth of that soul
may be slow, but its fruits are the fruits of the Spirit —
love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness,
faith, meekness, temperance.

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THE CLAIMS AND EXPECTATIONS OF
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Train up a child in the way he should go ; and when he is old, he
will not depart from it. — Prov. xxii., 6.

For the promise is unto you and to your children, and to all that are
afar off", even as many as the Lord our God shall call. — Acts ii., 39.

When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee,
which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois and thy mothei Eunice ;
and 1 am persuaded that in thee also, — 2 Tim. i., 5.

I rejoiced greatly that I found of thy children walking in truth. . . .

1 have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth. —

2 John i., 5 ; 3 John i., 4.

O God thou hast taught me from my youth. — Psalms Ixxi., 17.

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THE CLAIMS AND EXPECTATIONS OF
THE CHURCH.

In a former article we showed that the parent
represents the child — a principle that obtains both in
civil and religious affairs. When a parent lays hold
of the Covenant he lays hold of it for his child also,
and that child i'^ held bound by his parent's act, and
the Church regards him as so included till, by an after
life of sin, he shows that he refuses to make the
parent's act his own, and is resolved to separate him-
self By faith Noah prepared an ark for t/te saving
of his house, and, from his day to our own, he stands
forth as a proof that a righteous parent obtains a
blessing from the Lord, not only for himself but for
his children also. The New Testament says, " By
faith he saved his house." But this is just what the
Old Testament history has recorded of him, " I have
seen thee righteous before me, come thou and all thy
house into the ark." Even Ham, who, so far as
personal character was concerned, manifestly deserved
to perish with the ungodly world, was saved from the

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CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

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flood for his father's sake, and by his father's faith.
This law runs through the whole Bible — " If ye have
judged me to be faithful, come into my house!' No
truth is more clearly taught in the Bible than this :
that God blesses one for the sake of another. He
blessed the Egyptian for Joseph's sake ; He remem-
bered Abraham and sent Lot out of Sodom ; He
healed the daughter for the mother's sake, the son,
at the request of a pleading father, and the servant,
because of 1;he faith of his master, when neither
daughter, nor son, nor servant was aware of what
was being done for them. God would have saved
the doomed city for the sake of ten righteous men,
and He blesses us all for His Son's sake. Neither
with respect to this life, nor the life to come, does
God deal with us as isolated individuals. Therefore,
when God and the people entered into covenant ;
(Deut. xxix, $-13) the adults entered into covenant
for themselves, parents for their children, and masters
for their servants. So in the Sinai covenant parents
represented their children, and acted for them, when
God promised to be a God unto them, and they
promised to be His people, to have no other God than
Jehovah, to keep holy His Sabbaths, to do no
murder, etc. In this solemn transaction parents acted
for their children, as they again were to act for theirs
from generation to generation.

CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

103

THE BAPTISM OF CHILDREN.

In virtue of this organic life, this filial rel.tion, we
baptize children on the faith of the parent, and bap-
tized children feci (when they have grown up) that
they have been dedicated to God, and this alone has
been a gracious check on many a young life. The
thought that their parents had given them up to God,
and in loving trust committed them to the care of the
Good Shepherd, made a serious impression on them,
and held them in many an hour of danger.

As a general thing^ baptism for the children of the
Church — the lambs of the flock — is desired, and even
earnestly sought for by the heads of families. Never-
theless, many instances of carelessness and cruTiinal
neglect are constantly seen, where the children of pro-
fessing parents are allowed to grow up without baptism,
and are treated as if they were of the world, and not of
the Church. Such neglect is a great wrong, com-
mitted against all the parties represented in the ordi-
nance, viz., the child, the parents, the CJiurcJi and the
Saviour himself It is a robbery of the birthright
belonging to the young, and steps should be taken as
soon as possible to remedy the evil. We are losing
in spiritual power and efficiency, all the time, because
many of our people are not taught the nature and
practical uses of the baptism of children, and the
grand truths and principles to which the ordinance

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104

CLAIMS OF THE ClIURCIf.

points. They fail to realize the holy binding which
it lays upon them, bringing the home and all its
members under law to Christ. That most precious
and expressive ordinance which Christ appointed
ought to be one of the most effective instruments for
promoting Christian life, and keeping the young in
the fold where the Good Shepherd has put them.
And yet sufficient advantage is not taken of it by
parents, and their gross neglect becomes the occasion
for complaint against the ordinance itself, especially
when the baptized are treated as aliens. We are
persuaded that some comply, simply because it is a
custom, or an expressive rite, and not because they
sec the full advantage of it. With others it is merely
giving a name to the child. Such would not be
ready with an answer to any one who asked the
question, Oii bono ?

BAPTIZED CHILDREN, MEMBERS OF THE

CHURCH.

Baptists place their children outside of the Church,
and count them as aliens from God's people, till, on a
personal profession of faith, they are admitted. The
theory leaves the rising generation outside of Christian
life, and this treatment of children differs from all
the dispensations of God, and runs counter to His
arrangements, which is proof sufficient that it is not

CLAIMS OF THE CirURCH.

105

of God. When in baptism the attention is fixed on
the infant alone, without lookin^j to anything; further,
we may be inclined to ask — " What use is there in
it? What can an infant .\novv, or do, in the matter?"
But a moment's reflection will show this to be a very
limited and partial view of the ordinance. Without
discussing now the uses of infant baptism, we may
remark that one grand design is, to fix the attention on
the rising generation, and turn the hearts of the fathers
to their children, making their godly upbringing an
imperative duty, and putting the true type of their
moral and religious growth before the Church, viz.,
that children are to grow up in the nurture and
admonition of the Lord. Baptized infants arc made
and recognized as disciples in the school of Christ,
with a view to their future instruction. The com-
mand was to disciple all nations, and this discipling
applies to infants as well as to adults. For the word
does not imply previous learning, nor even present
learning, but learning m design. Not those who have
finished, not those alone who are in course of instruc-
tion, but even those who may not yet have begun, if
placed there for the purpose, may be fitly termed dis-
ciples. It is their future training that is the chief
concern, therefore the visible Church has charge of
those children and is bound to watch over them and
feel a responsibility for their godly upbringing. Not

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CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

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the parents alone, but the Church also — pastor, elder,
member — have all a solemn duty in teaching them
the fear of the Lord.

Circumcision laid a holy binding on the circumcised
to conform to the will of God. They became debtors
to do the whole law and must conform to its require-
ments ; and as children were circumcised as well as
adults, it lay as a solemn obligation on parents to
teach their children the meaning of the rite, the
truths to which it pointed, and the standing given by
it as the circumcision of God. In short, it fixed
attention on the rising race, and made their moral
and spiritual welfare the chief concern of parents ; and
this is precisely the case with baptism now. When
we taice Scriptural views of baptism, and know the
care that is to be taken of the young as the lambs of
Christ's flock, all unworthy views of the ordinance
vanish, and we see the place given to infant inscruc-
tion and training to be worthy of the wisdom and
love of God.

It cannot be too earnestly shown thdt baptized
children are disciples of Christ, introduced into His
school with a view to learning the lessons of His
grace, as all children are in the State with a view to
their full citizenship. And he who grows up and
fails to make God his friend, is false to his position as
a child of the covenant. Baptism leads us on to holy

CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

107

ground, and puts the Iambs within the sacred enclosure,
and guards them against sinful encroachment. Infant
baptism establishes a tender and sacred relationship,,
and gives the baptized a title to their inheritance, and
puts the key of our Father's house into the-ir hands.
And if they sell their birthright, fearful must be their
guilt. Let parents never cease to press these things
upon their children, and to exhort them as children
of the Church to make their calling and election sure.
What a powerful influence it ought to have on the
mind of the child, the constant feeliiig that his parents
have dedicated him to the Lord through baptism, and
enrolled him as a disciple ; that he is in consequence
to be constantly vv^atched over by the Church, and
that he is dear to the Chief Shepherd as a lamb of
His flock ! We can make the fact of their dedication
the plea with them before God, not to forsake the
God of their fathers ; \vc can plead ivitJi and for them
the promise of the Covenant that God will give our
children the blessing signified. We are permitted to
plead with a Covenant-keeping God, and to expect
that as households worship together on earth in the
Church below, so households will meet around the
throne on high and rejoice together, ascribing eterna)
praise to our Father who is not slack concerning His.
promises. And what a gracious influence all this,
must have on the minds of Christian parents, the

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sense of their responsibility as lying under vows of the
Lord concerning their children, knowing that their
chief concern is the moulding of their life, and that
the charge to bring them up in the nurture and
admonition of the Lord is a most solemn one.

A PRACTICAL MEASURE.

We would earnestly recommend the general prac-
tice observed by some congregations, of having all the
baptized children and young people assembled in the
body of the Church in the presence of the elders and
parents, and addressed on the duties and privileges
that belong to them as the children of the Covenant,
on the sin and danger of apostatizing, and the need
■of taking their place and assuming the character and
responsibilities that belong to them as members.
This might be done at a special service, or, better
still, at the ordinary diet for public worship. It is
said, on reliable authority, that the vast majority of
the children thus dealt with grow up pious members,
who take their place as naturally in the Church as
they do in the world. We cannot doubt it, for this is
the Lord's own plan, which He will not fail to bless.
Much is said about the best way of securing the con-
version of our children, and this is a most excellent
way; for this plan, if faithfully carried out, will render
their conversion unnecessary, and, by bringing them

CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

109

up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, will
prevent them from growing up in a life of sin. And
this would lead our people and the whole Church to
regard the baptism of children as a great spiritual
reality, and not a mere formal rite.

THE church's hopes REALIZED.

In this matter we do not act as sovereigns, but as
ministers of God's mercy. We can neither give the
child a new heart, nor predict with certainty its future
career. The children of pious parents often grow up
godless ; but the reason of this can generally be seen in
defective training, and in many inconsistencies between
the parents' theory and practice. We fully endorse
the words of Richard Baxter on this point, who says,
" Nineteen out of every twenty of our children, con-
secrated to God in their infancy, will grow up dutiful,
orderly, and serious, and before they have reached
mature age will recognize their membership by a
personal act with sincerity and to edification, if the
Divine plan with respect to this matter were fully
carried out." ,

The great change in the case of the young will
develop itself gradually, and concurrently with their
daily life. They will grow into their Divine life as
they grow into their manhood ; from being babes in
Christ, into the full stature of men. It is wonderful

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with what unanimity the leading men of the Church
of God attribute their Christian character to early-
training. From such men as Augustine, Bishop Hall,
Tiiomas Scott, Doddridge, Baxter, Cecil, and, in short,
all through the cloud of witnesses, we meet the same
uniform testimony, " We are more than half what our
mothers made us." ( Vinet.)

How interesting, yet how solemn the position of
those who have been dedicated to the Lord in bap-
tism, and who grow up in the Church in the full
enjoyment of all her privileges, but who have never
complied with her obligations, and stand apart as
aliens would do ! To these young people themselves
we would now say with all earnest affection : "You do
not avoid your responsibilities by simply refusing
your recognition of them. We have to tell you that
you are living in disobedience knowingly : you are
proving false to the place given you, and which you
now hold as children of the Church : you are refusing
to pay your vows to the Lord which He claims from
you : and you are consequently in danger of incur-
ring His sore displeasure."

The baptism of these little children commits them
to the Lord's side, and though they may live to deny
Him, they can never escape those holy bonds that
have encircled them from infancy. To their latest
day, though they may have grown up in sin, we still

CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

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regard them as prisoners of hope, and must continue
to tell them that the vows of the Lord are upon them,
and that all gracious influences have been thrown
around them, and now combine to keep them in the
fold, or bring back the erring when they have wan-
dered away. So that even with regard to those who
renounce their birthright, who leave their Father's
house to live in riot and sir, '^' ^ Church, if wise, must
still bear with them, and exercise a wise oversight.
She will find room for the exercise of a large, Christian
common sense, following them with her prayers, as
parents do their wayward children. Hope may have
to look into the future through tears ; for a father
waits long before he shuts the door against his
prodigal child, and always leaves a place in his heart
for the prodigal's return, and, when he meets him,
kisses away the tears of penitence from his cheeks.

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VARIED EXPERIENCES OF THE CHRISTIAN.

Infant discipleship and growth in grace ought to
correct the false philosophy of many in regard to a
uniform experience in the Divine life which is insisted
on. Additions are made to the Church by adult
conversions from the v/orld. We rejoice in this, and
hope they may be multiplied a thousand fold. But
what the Church should most naturally expect is
progressive sanctification, growth in grace from infancy,

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and development from within. Paul was brought
into the kingdom in one way; Nicodemus in another;
and Timothy in yet another. Lydia was converted
to the Christian faith, but her children were brought
up in it, and each had an experience according to the
circumstances. But because one man grows up in
sin, and is converted late in life, with accompaniments
of law-work peculiar to itself; it is wrong to teach
that all must grow up in sin, children of the devil, to
be converted late in life in order to be saved. That
because there has been a crisis in the spiritual history
of one man, there must be a similar crisis in the case
of all God's people ; that because one can tell when
he was cc -erted, all must be able to tell ; that
because it was men and women who were converted
and added to the Church on the day of Pentecost, this
is the only way in which the Church can grow by
additions from without ; and that, as faith was required
in those cases in order to baptism, there can be no
baptism without faith ; that because Lydia was con-
verted, her children must be converted, etc. — all this is
false reasoning and very misleading, because it applies
that which is true only in certain instances, and special
occasions, to all cases indiscriminately. The growing
of the divine life in the heart of a child, and its feeble
apprehensions of duty, cannot be the same as in the
case of an adult ; and yet all must admit there is

CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

such a thing as the informing of Christian character
in the heart of a child. The experience of the jailer
who had never heard of a Saviour till that memor-
able night from Paul's lips, and that of his children
who would grow up in a Christian home, must have
been very different. And this is a very partial view
of Christian experience that does not allow for the
varying testimony of Paul, who had been a fierce
persecutor, compared with that of Timothy, who never
was anything else than a child of God. Nothing short
of criminal blindness would seek to compress these
into one mould. In the growth of an infant to man-
hood, each day makes very little difference in stature
and wisdom, and yet it is by these slight additions that
manhood is reached, and the imperfect years of child-
hood left behind. So grace, in the hearts of infants,
like this gradual growth in bodily stature, though
quiet and imperceptible, may not be the less real, nay,
is rather in harmony with all growth. It is often
insisted on, that all who are Christ's must be able to
tell the time and place^ the ivJien and the how of a
work of grace in the heart. A premium is put on
this testimony, while the inability to do this is made
by some an evidence of an unconverted state. But,
we believe that, in the great majority of cases, our
spiritual experience cannot be so mapped out. And
the pressing for it in this form distresses and misleads

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many earnest souls, ...id overlooks wholly the very
truth on which we are insisting. Many children of
God have been greatly troubled because their experi-
ence does not correspond to the descriptions of con-
version which they hear spoken of But why should
the testimony of Paul to hfs conversion disturb the
peace of Timoth}^ who never needed to be converted,
who knew the Scriptures from a little child, and was
a child of grace all his days? Let every growth
spring from its own root, and develop in its own way,
and then all life will be beautiful.

How many have had their peace broken, and their
fears excited, because when hearing others tell of
their convictions, struggles, terrors, their spiritual
throes, and then peace and joy, they imagine some-
thing must be lacking in themselves ! " Oh, see how it
is with others, how definitely they can tell of the Lord's
work of grace in their souls ! Oh, that we could be
thus definite, and tell the day of our conversion, and
the method of the Spirit's work in our heart ! But
we could never discover our first act of trust in the
Saviour, or the first dawn of hope, or the first influence
of love ! " But this neither surprises nor alarms us.
What if the Spirit meant you to have your own experi-
ence, and not another's, as He meant you to have your
own life and work ! What if it should be the same in
grace as in nature, for who can remember his birth

CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

115

into this world ? My son loves me, but I would not
like if he could tell when he began to love me. My
babe, even, is mine, though it cannot speak my name!
We may wrong both ourselves and our Saviour ; we
may disparage the grace of God, and grieve the Spirit
by doubting our interest in Christ, because we cannot
tell the things the Spirit never m ant us to know. If
the genuine fruits of the Spirit begin to appear in our
life, we need not be distressed if we cannot ^ell when
they began to grow, or when bud or blossom appeared.
The most important growth is under the soil. Paul
could tell the day of his conversion to the Christian
faith, for he had grown up in a hard, cruel, Jewish
home till the day God called him by his grace, and,
moreover, it had around it the machinery of the ^ per-
natural. But Timothy could not tell, for he grew up
in the nurture of the Lord in a Christian home, under
the best of all instructors — a mother who trained him
for the Lord from infancy. Paul referred to Timothy's
advantages, which were superior to his own, and em-
phasized the blessedness of knowing the Scriptures
from childhood. Paul grew up for future conversion ;
but under a Christian mother's care, Timothy grew up
a child of grace, like John the Baptist, who was conse-
crated to the Lord from his mother's womb, and was
never anything else than a lamb of the flock. And
to demand from Timothy the same experience, and

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the same confession, would keep him out of the
Church forever. Some are brought into the kingdom
through convictions long and severe, when Sinai
thunders, loud and alarming. These could as readily
forget their existence as the time of their birth-throes.
But with others, and especially those whose early
Christian nurture has been most earnestly attended
to in the home, grace will be infused into the soul
from day to day, gently and imperceptibly ; the hidden
leaven gradually leavening the whole lump. In their
case there is nj sudden crisis, as there need be none.
On many a heart the Spirit distils His influence as
silently as the dew falls on the tender grass, and light
breaks over the soul as it does over the world, more
and more unto the perfect day. And the Church will
make a great mistake if she seeks to wring out the
saxTie testimony in all cases, and she must guard
against lifting particulars into universals, taking what
is obviously exceptional, and making it the normal
condition. The circumstances attending Paul's con-
version were most obviously exceptional. But to
Samuel, John the Baptist, Timothy, and the vast
majority who are being brought up in the nurture and
admonition of the Lord, *:he kingdom of God cometh
not W;th observation, but the spiritual life is developed
concurrently with the natural, as was the life of the
Holy Child Jesus.

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THE REAL RESPONSIBILITV OF THE YOUNG.

. Often when pressing the claims of the Saviour
upon the young, and seeking to lead them to the
Lord's Table, they have replied : " We admit all you
say, but it is such a responsibility to join the Church ;
or, if I were a Church member, I could not do as Mr.
So-and-so does." But not having joined the Church,
and not being mem.bers, the young imagine they are
freed from all responsibility, and that until such time as
they come and profess faith in Christ, the Church has
no claim upon them. But what if it be replied, "You
were born members, and mis membership has been
recognized in baptism ; you have, in consequence,
enjoyed all the privileges of the Church's influence
and teachings, and the fact that you now refuse to
accept pardon from a merciful God, and salvation at
the hands of your Saviour, does not lessen your
responsibility, for all are under law to Christ, and
those who are not His children are rebels. When
you were made members the Saviour did not require
your consent, just as the State did not ask your con-
sent when you were made a subject. In both cases
you were born into your place and privileges. And
the question you have now got to answer is not,
"Whether you are the Lord's by self-dedication, and
subject to the laws of His house," but, "Will you
break those holy bonds asunder ? Will you renounce

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your obligations and, by abjuring your allegiance,
become a rebel? Will you prove false to the position
and privileges your Christian baptism gave you ?
Have you freely and gladly, with mind and heart,
accepted that place then given you, and voluntarily
assumed the character of a disciple?" You say, " It
is a very responsible thing to Join the Cliurch I " But
is it more responsible to venture forward, leaning on
His promised grace, than to feel that by neglect and
sinful postponement you are in danger of grieving the
Spirit and drawing back to perdition ?

THE rOWER OF EARLY TRAINING.

How often does our early training lay hold of our
later life and keep us back from sin, and bring us into
conscious covenant relations ! "Train up a child," etc.
is often here fulfilled. " There is a wonderful ten-
dency on dying beds to take on afresh the experiences
of childhood. What an encouragement to pious
mothers ! Infantile em^' lions, I am sure, often return
in the last days of life, a^id a mother's advice rings in
the ears of the prodigal son. This gives her greater
hope in talking with those who, however wicked, have
been trained for God in their infancy." The man who
was by copmon consent regarded as the highest living
exponent and representative of Calvinism, has said
that probably the great majority of real Christians

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119

are regenerated in their infancy, so that their after
conversion is only the blossoming out into manifesta-
tion of a life received from heaven at the beginning
of their career. So the position we arc arguing for
is not a novelty in the Church.

The young, growing up, have a strong claim for the
exercise of a wise, loving. Christian charity, and a
tender, sympathetic restraining hand, and the Church
must see that in the flock of Christ the lambs are well
cared for. Let all who have them in charge dwell
long and fondly on these blessed themes, and they
must never forget that the children are to be recog-
nized and treated as members of the visible Church
of Christ. In much love, and with a patience that
never fails, show them that they cannot without great
guilt break the connection given them ; that the
Saviour expects them as the objects of all this care
to act worthily. He hedges them round on every
side ; He throws around them gracious and helpful
influences, so that if they break away from all
restraint they will have to break through the barriers
which His grace threw around them, and go forth into
wickedness with greater guilt, as those who knew their
Master's will but have not done it. The Jew hac his
position given him as a member of the commonwccilth
of Israel, that he might learn to keep the law of God
and receive the circumcision of the heart, as well as

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CLAIMS OF THE CUURCII.

that which was in the flesh. So have the young to-
day their places given them in the Church of God.
It will be fatal if the young misunderstand this ; let
them be wise in time, and as the children whom the
Lord hath blessed, they must learn to love and serve
Him with a true heart, and with a willing mind, and
make their right of property in the covenant a right
of possession through faith.

THOSE OF WHOM WE STAND IN DOUBT.

What shall be done with those who grow up in the
Church, and in mature life not only stand aloof, but
trample the law of Christ under their feet, and
ignore all the claims which His Church and people
lay upon them ? We must admit the sad fact that
thousands who have been baptized, and who should
be in the Church, are to-day serving the devil ; living
a life of sin, in open violation of every vow ! We now
ask, What shall be done with all such ? Shall we cut
them off summarily? Shall we at once proceed to
arraign, condemn and punish them, and brand them
with the mark of Cain ? So some would counsel us
to do, and such would seem to be the logical conse-
quence of our theory. Or, shall we, on the other
hand, allow them to remain undisturbed and unre-
buked, as if all were right, and nothing else expected
from them ? Surely fidelity to our Master would for-

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121

bid this also ! What then are we to do in all such
cases of seeming apostacy? At this point let me ask
a question of parents. What do you do in your
own homes with a wayward son or daughter who is
rebellious under your authority, or, it may be, has
thrown off parental restraint!* Do you shut your
door against them at once, and drive them from your
heart? Do you not rather leave a place for repent-
ance, and let your door remain open for their return ?
Do you not wait in faith and patience, and even con-
tinue to plead with them, with the tear in your eye,
and a yearning fondness in your heart ? Hope dies
hard in a parent's heart; for even when children have
gone far astray, you follow them with your prayers
and do not give them up as lost. How long a father
will wait ! And a mothei far longer, with more of hope
in her yearnirig heart ! And Jesus longest of all ! Kis
patience and love are wonderful, and many whom we
thought lost are held by Him, and led to retrace their
steps.

See that mother in her Highland home as she
kneels at evening prayer. Draw near and listen to
her words, as her teirs fall thick and fast through her
fingers on the floor, " Lord, have mercy on that poor
lassie, wherever she may be this night. Let her not
die in her sins b ' *

bring

agan

may bring her back to Thee." Then she rises from

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CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

her knees, and goes out to look through the darkness,
as if to see if the erring one be near. She comes in,
shuts the door but leaves it unbarred, saying to her-
self, " I will not bolt it, lest she should come when I
am asleep, and I would not like her to find my door
locked against her. She might think I did not want
to have her in the home again, but God knows how I
yearn and pray for it." What wealth of love in that
poor mother's heart ! But His love is still more won-
derful. A mother's love can be understood, but the
love of Christ passeth knowledge. What bonds so
strong and enduring as those cords of His love with
which He waits to bind us to Himself!

In the same way must the Church deal with her
erring children. She, too, must leave a place for
repentance and wait long with the door open. For
the Saviour often shows us that He has not lost hold
of many, whom we have long since consigned to per-
dition. She follows the erring with her prayers, and
pleads that the Good Shepherd may seek and find
those sheep that are wandering on the dark moun-
tains of sin, and bring them back into the fold. Let
Christian people take a deeper interest in the young,
and a more hopeful view of their spiri*;ual state. And
when they go astray tell them of the wrong wisely ;
remind them in the spirit of kindness , entreat them
lovingly as Christ would do ; care for them, and plead

CLAIMS OF THE CHURCH.

123

with them as if they were your own flesh and blood ;
and never mistake the authority of technicality and
law for the influence of love and faith. Love suffereth
long and is kind. Love thinketh no evil ; beareth all
things ; believeth all things ; hopeth all things ;
endureth all things, i^ove never faileth.

Let these graces still abide in the Church, faith,
hope, love ; these three. But the greatest of these is
LOVE.

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VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE AND
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Now there are diversities of gifts but the same Spirit. — i Cor. xii,, 4.

And there are differences of administrations but the same Lord. —
I Cor. xii., 5. •

And there are diversities of operations but it is the same God who
worketh all in all. — I Cor. xii., 6.

But all these worketh that one and the self-same Spirit, dividing to
every man severally as he will. — i Cor. xii., 11.

For the body is not one member but many. — i Cor. xii., 14.

Feed my /amds — apvia fiov.

Feed my s/ieep—TrpojSaTa fiov.

Feed my sheeplings — 7rp6j3ana juov.

— ^John xxi., 15-17.
Whose heart the Lord opened. — Acts xvi., 14.

But grow in grace, and in the kncv,rledge of our Lord and Saviour
Jesus Christ. — 2 Peter iii., 18.

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VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE AND
EXPERIENCE IN THE CHURCH.

We have already briefly referred to this point, but
the subject is of sufficient importance to demand
further consideration. False ideals of Christian life
and character sought to be realized in the experience
of many earnest people have injured them. Artificial
methods of living, and arbitrary tests of the Spirit's
presence, are most hurtful. Seeking to reproduce the
experience of some one else in their life has caused
many to enter the Kingdom of Heaven halt ind
maimed, who might have entered as strong men in
all the symmetrical proportions of grace. In conse-
quence, our Christian character is often lopsided, like
a tree with a branch sticking out only in one direction :
one side pushed out into undue prominence. One
man makes his religion consist i'^ negations : a
Christian must not dance, must not play cards,
must not go to parties, etc. Another man is wild
on the question of temperance : a man who takes a
glass of spirituous liquor cannot be a Christian.

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VAUIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

False ideals of experience and life, dreamy notions
of what is called the higher Christian life, erroneous
views of holiness, artificial methods of Church discip-
line, cause many to remain, spiritual dwarfs all their
days, instead of becoming rounded out on all sides —
full, rich, symmetrical, — growing up into the full
stature of perfect men in Christ Jesus. Many are
permanently injured by the very earnestness with
which they translate into practice a false conception
of what they regard as the uniform experience of a
believer's life. It is easy to simulate an experience,
and persuade men that they have it; and then men
will come into the Church on a false basis, and build
up an artificial character. Let every man have his
own experience, and that will be according to his
nature, organization, t id past history.

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NO UNIFORM CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE.
What a wonderful variety obtains in the world of
nature ! There are no two objects exact copies of ea»jh
other, of all that has been created ; no two trees, or
flowers, or blades of grass that grow alike ; not two
faces among all the generations of men, that may not
be known from each other by marks of difference !
With what profusion God's bountiful hand hath
scattered its beauties over the face of the world, and
with what rich variety His fingers have painted its

VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

129

pictures ! Monotony is everywhere broken up, and
the universe is filled with the manifoldness that
characterizes the great Creator. And, as in nature,
so in grace we find the same rich variety. No two
creations of the Divine Spirit are exactly the same.

Some people insist on a uniform Christian expe-
rience on the part of all God's children. And many
earnest souls are greatly troubled because their con-
scious experiences of life, and of the Divine dealings
towards them are very unlike the experiences and
dealings of some others of whom they hear, that are
looked upon as models and are supposed to live very
near to God. The attempt is often made to put all
into one mould, to produce one type, to wring out one
testimony from every life ; and in this way much mis-
conception is produced and many unnecessary alarms
are caused in the minds of earnest people.

One man sper^ks of passing through long days of
mental conflict ; of having deep convictions of sin ;
great fear of the Divine wrath. For weeks and
months he felt as one hanging over the very brink of
perdition. And then at last light dawned, the load
was removed, and he obtained peace in believing.
And this man, ever after, looks back to this experi-
ence of his as a necessary step in the Divine life,
and even doubts the reality of a man's Christian char-
acter if he cannot point back to the same experience.

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FA AVE TV OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

One man has struggled long and sorely, and even now
hardly dares to call himself a Christian. Like the pro-
digal he feels unworthy to be called a son, and pleads
to be made only as one of the hired servants ; while
another has been awakened into the sense of the
Divine consciousness, as a litt)'^ child awakes from its
slumbers in its mother's arms — calm, peaceful, trust-
ful. Some come into the kingdom through storm
and darkness, while others awake to find themselves
lying on the Divine bosom. Csesar Malan, the cele-
brated Genevan divine, says, he was awakened into
the Divine love, as a mother awakes her child by a
sweet kiss on its cheek. And because there is such
a difference between the experiences of these men, the
one doubts the reality of the other's faith. But no
two men have had the same religious experience.
Our Christian life is as personal and diversified as
our external history has been. The dealings of God
with one man may be as different from his dealings
with another as the differences in the features of men's
faces. Though it is the same Spirit, there are diver-
sities of gifts, and he divides to every man severally
as he wills. N^w if we teach people the necessity
of such and such experiences as a necessary condition
of entering the kingdom, of passing through certain
phases of feeling, it will either cause them fear, or
they will begin to imagine they have had those

VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

131

experiences, and passed through those feeh'ngs. And
in this way, there is great danger of producing an
artificial type of life. For much that goes by the
name of religious feeling is produced under false
ideals, and is unnatural.

DIFFERENT TYPES OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

The type of Christian life in any one age will
depend largely on the surroundings and character-
istics of that age. The type of life in the Highlands
of Scotland a hundred years ago, when " THE MEN "
were seers of visions and dreamers of dreams, and
stood on the very borders of the invisible world, and
imagined they had special glimpses of its secrets,
is very unlike the type of Christian life found in our
churches to-day. Yet these were all men of God,
who lived near to the Saviour in their day, while those
who differ from them are as truly men of God, who
live just as near. It is simply a different mould in
which they were cast. The Puritan character — stalwart
and unbending — diffe*-s much from that of represen-
tative men in our time, and yet there is no degeneracy.
Those men were full of faith and of the Holy Ghost,
and so are the men now — each for his own time and
work. Some of the things we regard as lawful in the
wise use of our Christian liberty our God-fearing fore-
fathers would have been scandalized at ; and in say-

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ing this we do not exalt them, nor yet reflect on our-
selves. The times were simply different, and so were
the men ; and this variety will continue through all
the ages of faith ; but underneath it all, men may be
found equally loyal in their hearts, devout, reverent,
and all swayed alike by the claims of the Redeemer.
It is neither a praise nor a disparagement of thcm^
nor of us, to say, that we condemn some of the cur-
rent practices of our fathers, while they opposed
customs and practices which we have adopted.

We meet with a yj^ry different type of life in the
quiet country side, in the little meeting-Jiouses, amid
the open spaces of heaven, from that found ir >e
great centres of life, throbbing witl\ emotion „..u
tinged with a thousand influences. And yet people
equally dear to the Saviour may live in both places.
The one may wonder at the narrow, contracted, and
what might well be characterized as the mean ways
of the other. Or the latter may be horrified at the
extravagant, gay, and seemingly worldly conduct of
the former, and yet both may be under the same
guiding hand ; for the Lord's sympathies do not
always run in the channels of our prejudices.

But coming from the oiitivard to the inner life of
the believer ; from what is incidental and temporary
to what is vital and permanent, we meet with the
same variety in the lives and hearts of men, for there

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VAKIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

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the

are difTerences of administration under the same Lord ;
4.g.^ Paul's conversion had elements in it very different
from tnose that characterized the conversion of Nico-
demus, or that of James, Peter, or John, who simply
left their boats and came to Jesus, and yet they were
all led by the same spirit of promise. While each of
these again differed from Timothy, who grew up in
the truth from infancy, and never knew what sepa-
ration from his Lord meant. And all these differed
from Newton, or Col. Gardiner, who had lived loose,
licentious lives, till the Divine Spirit laid His hand
•on their hearts and changed icm for God.

But because one man grows up in a life of sin, and
is converted later in life, it is wrong to teach that all
men must grow up in sin, children of wrath, to be
converted as Newton was ; that because there has
been a great crisis in the spiritual history of one man,
therefore there must be a similar crisis in the history
of all God's people ; that because it was men and
women who were converted and added to the Church,
that this is the only way they ever should be received ;
that because faith is required before baptism in the
■case of an aduU, there can be no baptism without
.faith in the person baptized ; or because one man
thinks he can tell the time of his conversion, all
- ^believers must be able to do the same. All this is
false reasoning and very misleading, because it applies

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VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

what is true only in certain instances, and on special
occasions, to all cases indiscriminately. It overlooks
the teaching of Scripture and the facts of Christian
experience.

The growing of the Divine life in the heart of a
child, the feeble apprehensions of duty, the gradual,
maturing of the Christian character of the young can-
not be the same as in the case of an adult. And yet
all believe there is such a thing as early Christian
nurture, and the informing of Christian character in
the heart of a child, and that the Imnbs, as well as the
sheep, belong to the Good Shepherd. In the growth
of an infant to manhood, each day makes very little
difference in stature and wisdom. Yet it is by these
very additions that manhood is reached, and the
imperfect years of chi'dhood left behind. So grace,,
like this gradual growth in bodily stature, though
quiet, and imperceptible, and slow, is not the less real,
or progressive, or ripe in the final results.

THE HOLY spirit's VARIED WORKING.

But it is said " It is the same grace that is applied,
and the same Spirit that works in all hearts ; and
His presence and manifestations must be the same
wherever He works." It is affirmed that the fruits of
the Spirit must be uniform v/herever they grow. But
we believe that both Scripture and Christian experi-

VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

135

ence point to an opposite conclusion ; for not only
has the same body many members, but the same
Spirit has different ministrations and diversities of
gifts to suit all these members.

Is it not the same sun that shines over all our
world to-day, but how endlessly varied is his work !
Yet all is beautiful, and we rejoice in the endless
variety of it. With as much reason might it be said
that because it is the same sun, his work must be
everywhere the same ! But is it ? Why, there are
not two objects alike, which that sun creates on all the
face of the globe ! Some are trees, some shrubs, and
some flowers. Some are high and others low, while
yet others creep on the ground ; all shapes, all colours;
a wonderful diversity, from the little moss at your foot
to the great cedars of Lebanon ! No two objects are
exact copies of each other in that wonderful prodi-
gality, and profuse variety, and yet all are perfect
after their kind. Why then may we not expect the
same variety in the spiritual world as we actually see
in the natural ? We know that the same God works
in grace who works hi nature, and why may He not
manifest the same variety in His works? According
to a man's past life, his organization and tempera-
ment, his knowledge, and the place he is to occupy,
and the work he may be called upon to do, will be
that man's experience under the Spirit's dealings ; in

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VARFETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

some cases quick, pungent, vi, id ; in others quiet,
slow, but sure as the opening blosson:i. The spiritual
crisis of one man may be accompanied with storms,
thunder, earthquake, and eclipse. While that of
another will be the quiet, almost unfelt dawning of
the day of peace ; grace being informed, and working
silently as leaven leavening the lump.

When the claims of the Redeemer are pressed upon
the conscience, one man may decide with such resolu-
tion and vigour as will mark a definite act in his I'.fe ;
his heart yields like the bi caking open of a seal.
While the decision of another may be as quiet and
peaceful as the meeting of two summer clouds, which
blend their fleecy fulness together, with no jarring or
noise. If the grace of God lay hold of a profligate,
or of a man who has consciously spurned his duty, he
will be more apt to have deep convictions, and even
stings of conscience, more especially if any great
outv/ard trial be laid upon him. But a moral man
who has been surrounded, and his character moulded,
by religious influences from boyhood ; who has hovered
on the borders of decision for many a day, may have
a very different experience. Even when he is enter-
ing fully on the Christian life, it may be to him more
like making up his mind to pursue a certain course ;
the formation of a mental judgment, and the following
of it up ; a sense of duty, more or less strong, laid

upon his conscience ; and a resolve to perform his
vows hitherto neglected. Any of these things may-
mark his spiritual history.

The day of conversion may be distinctive and
clearly relieved against the background of the past
life ; and some point back to an experience which
they regard as the great crisis when they passed from
death unto life. Oftener, however, it is the quicken-
ing and growth of a principle developed concurrently
with our daily life. The sunshine and the shower
have come alternately, and, as the result, the fields
are green and rich, but who cm remember all the
showers that have produced this beauty ? So our

spiritual life to-day is the result of all that has gone
before us ; of all the influences, good and bad, that

have touched and shaped us into our present selves.

How does the day dawn ? I s it suddenly, as by a flash

of lightning ? No, the first faint streaks appear no

man can tell how or when ; but they broaden id

deepen more and more unto the perfect day. So does

the light of God's love break over many a hearc when

the Spirit shines into it. How does the summer

come, suddenly as from one impulse ? No, it comes

gradually through many days, that sometimes threaten

to throw us back into winter again. In the same way

summer comes in the soul, and life buds and blossoms

under the beams of the Sun of Righteousness.

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VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

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THE RELIGIOUS LIFE OF CHILDREN.

What we have said above applies specially to the case
of children, and is the common experience of those who
grow up amid the ordinances and privileges of God's
house ; they are not converted, but grow up in the
nurture and admonition of the Lord. These children
may be, and often are, subjects of the Spirit's presence
from infancy ; and how could they tell the day
of conversion, for they have never known what aliena-
tion from God means ? " Do you remember when
you hated God?" asked an examining deacon of a
young candidate for admission to the Lord's table.
" No, I always loved Cod," was the timid reply. And
the good deacon had some doubts as to the orthodoxy
of the answer, for he imagined, because he could
remember such a time in his own case, when he hated
God, that there must be such a time in the case of
everyone.

Let no one believe that this teaching undervalues
the Holy Spirit's work. We grant the need of His
presence and power in the case of all, both old and
)''Oung. The need of a spiritual birth is universal.
But let us not forget the varieties of form under which
this change may be wrought. Who dares affirm that
the Spirit and the soul can come together in only
one way, or produce but one experience in all ?
Must every case be one of self-conscious conversion

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139

involving a struggle with sin, more or less protracted ?
A long period of laiu zvork, under conscious displea-
sure followed by peace and joy ? Cannot a child bo
brought up in grace ? Must a child be dealt with in
the same way as an adult? Is there no grace, and
dealing, and life proper to a child ? Do we say a
great spiritual change is needed by all, but infants
are not capable of that change? If this be so, then
the good Lord is more cruel to little children than
He is to any other creature in His Universe. Who
dares affirm that a child cannot belong to Christ till
he is older ? Or do we pray that God may convert
them when they are older, but do not expect Him
to take them now ? Our view on this point will
determine our whole spiritual attitude toward them.
When Bunyan starts his pilgrim from the city
of destruction to the celestial city, he makes him
carry his heavy burden for a long time till he comes
in sight of the cross ; he falls into the slough of
despond ; he loses his way ; comes near the burning
mountains ; he has to fight for his life, time and again.
In short, his whole progress is a scries of encounters
with determined enemies, and he finds the way most
hazardous. But when his wife starts along the same
road she has very few of these rough experiences,
and her children have none at all. True, he tells us,
they cried a little, but that was because they had not

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VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

started with their father. Bunyan, though a Baptist,
believed that it was possible for children to start on
the way to heaven with their father, and that they
might all start as a family together; while the children
would have their own experiences, which would be
different from those of their parents. And in all this
the dreamer has conformed to the teaching of scrip-
ture, and is true to Christian experience as this is
interpreted by daily life.

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THERE SHOULD BE ROOM FOR VARIETY.

We must not imagine that children coming home
must see and hear exactly the same things ; provided
they all co7ne home we need not be too anxious about
the experiences of the way. One man tells how the
Spirit laid hold of him, and how he lay for weeks in
distress of mind, and how at length ligh<- dawned.
He could as soon forget himself as forget the time of
that striving ! While another knows that he has had
no such experience, and if it be esocntial he must
still be in his sins ! One has come in amid storm
and darkness, and the other grew in quiet peaceful-
ness, as the dawning of the summer morning. Yet
both of these men many be leaning with equal trust
on the same Saviour, and growing up into the same
fulness.

Some men come into the Kingdom, as the breaking

VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

up of an ice-bound river in spring-time : there is a
freshet ; confusion and considerable danger ; while
others glide in quietly, as the summer cloud that forms
in the sky. " Some have been allowed to stumble in
head first, with all manner of crudities, yet they have
come in, and we thank God for it. But others come
into the Christian life with as little friction, as little
ado, as little conspicuity, and yet with as much cer-
tainty as a cloud forms in the pure mountain air. . . .
Don't disturb them. If they love Christ, if their
hearts gush out in praise ; if they betake themselves
to the ways of Christian life, its dispensations, its
bounty, its magnanimity, its generosity, its truth, its
self-government, its ardent passion of life, its self-
denial in love, — if they betake themselves to these
things, never put them back by asking, * In what way
did you come ? Were your experiences orthodox ?' "
Beecher.

Wherever a flower grows it is the proof of its own
beauty : and wherever the fruits of the Spirit are
seen, it is the all-sufficient evidence of His presence
and power in the heart.

CULTIVATE INDIVIDUALITY.

If the Christian life is natural there must be indi-
viduality. Each child of God must be himself, and
can be no other man, let him do as he may. All true

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VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

fruit must grow on its own root and stem, and in its
own way. Every stream must have its own channel,
and flow f-om its own fountain. We injure ourselves
and blight our Hfe, by trying to copy some one whom
we admire, and who has become a model to us. We
feel bound to walk in his steps, with his pace, and
clothe ourselves in his garments, whether they be suit-
able or not. We get false ideals of what we should
be and do. And in this way all true, natural growth
is stunted by being cast in an artificial mould. Copy
no man ; but the Lord Jesus Christ, the perfect
pattern, and by His grace strive to be yourself, and
let every man develop the tendencies and features
that belong to him, and are the natural outcome
of his own life. " There was never anything that so
nearly killed me," says Beecher, " as trying to be
Jonathan Edwards. I did try hard to mould my
character and experience upon his. I then tried to
be Brainerd, I then tried to be James Brainerd Tay-
lor, then I tried to be Payson, then I tried to be
Henry Martyn, and then I gave it up, and succeeded
in being nothing but myself" , . ;

But why should men try to translate themselves
into something else. The same sun that shines round
and round this great globe, and pours its Mght and
glory over the cedars of Lebanon and on the slop* ig
sides of the Alps and the Andes, shines also on the

VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

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little moss, and modest, shrinking flower, and gives its
distinctive shape and colouring to each thing that
grows. And so the love of God that broods over
men, and beautifies the Church of the Redeemer,
clothes her in variegated garments. The same Sun
of Righteousness sheds his beams on high and low ;
and the Divine Spirit that fills them with His fulness
imparts to each believer, and gives him his own dis-
tinctive character. Each thing that the Sun creates
has its own individuality ; and so each soul into which
the Holy Spirit breathes His quickening grace has its
own distinctive life. Dale, in his lectures on preach-
ing, expresses this very beautifully. " The city of
God has twelve gates : every one of them is a gate
of pearl. What presumption it is to insist that unless
men enter by a particular gate he cannot enter at all !
Let them enter by the gate that is nearest to them.
Nor should we insist that to reach the gate itself there
is only one road. Some men find their way to it by
the path of duty ; some through ravines of gloomy
desolation and despair; some across pleasant meadows
bright with the sunshine of hope, and musical with the
song of birds. When once they are among the happy
nations of the saved, inside the jasper walls, no one
will challenge their right to a place in the holy city,
because they entered by the wrong gate or approached
the right gate by the wrong road."

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VARIETY OF CHRISTIAN LIFE.

Don't let us linger too long on the ivay or method
of our coming to Christ. Have we come, and do we
now trust Him as our Divine Saviour? If we do
hear and obey the Shepherd's voice, we need not be
afraid because our experiences do not correspond to
the experience of some one else, whom the Master is
training for other service and in other ways. For the
Shepherd not only calls each of His sheep by name,
but he leads them forth, each by a different way, and
still they all meet at last in the same fold.

THIS VARIETY IS PRESUPrOSED IN ALL TRUE
CHRISTIAN TEACHING.

As there is no uniform experience, we must not
imagine a man wrong because he has not travelled
our way, and seen things in our light. Both our
pulpits and Sabbath-schools, in order to hold the
intelligence and moral worth of many of our people,
must enlarge their conception of what Christian life
and experience are, and concede the fact that they
are not cast in one mould. False ideas of Christian
character sought to be realized in the experience of
many earnest people have greatly injured them. Arti-
ficial tests and laws of life have been most hurtful.
Seeking to reproduce the experience of some one else
in their own sphere has caused many to enter the

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14;

kingdom of heaven halt and maimed, who might have
entered as strong men to run a race.

By an attempt to secure uniformity, Christian
character, as we have ah-eady observed, has often
been left lopsided, like a tree with one tremendous
branch sticking out, only in one direction ; one side
stunted, while the other is pushed out in undue promi-
nence. In this way many remain spiritual dwarfs,
instead of being rounded out on all sides — full, rich,
symmetrical — growing up into the full stature of per-
fect men in Christ. Many are permanently injured
by the very earnestness with which they try to
translate into practice a false ideal of what they call
the higher Christian life. Erroneous views of holiness
and artificial methods of Christian discipline have
blighted them.

The problem for the pulpit to solve is the
separation between what is accidental, and what is
essential, in the life of a child of God. A sanctified
common sense must be evoked that takes a wider and
a wiser view of God's dealings with men, and sees that
while all life is sacred and nothing common or un-
clean when done by the direction of Our Master, we
can serve God in the field, the shop, the factory, the
office, as well as in the pulpit, and that sometimes
parents are the best preachers of righteousness and
the most effective interpreters of the love of God.

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And as Jesus suited himself to all, and administered
to each as he was able to bear it, so all who have
learned of Him must do the same. He took the little
children into His arms, and blessed them as His own;
he spake to the people with a tear in His eye ; He
rebuked or encouraged ; welcomed or sent away ;
again He taught multitudes while His heart over-
flowed with love, and His emotions mastered Him.
And all who have learned of Him, must do as He
did, and, as far as possible, make their ministrations
timely, taking into account the wonderful diversi-
ties of the Holy Spirit's work. And, as it has ever
been on the earth — each believer must sing his own
song, in his own way, and look back upon a history
peculiarly his own, so will it continue to be in
heaven, all individuality preserved, for even there
one star differeth fro . another star in glory.

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The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth are set
on edge. — ^Jer. xxxi., 29.

Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third
and fourth generation of them that hate me, etc. — Ex. xx., 5-6.

And it shall come to pass, *hen your children will say to you, What
mean ye by this service ? that ye shall say. It is the sacrifice of the
Lord's passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel
in Egypt when he smote the Egyptians, and delivered our houses. —
Ex, xii., 26-27.

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FAMILY LIFE.

God's dealings have always been with the family
rather than with individuals. There is no better proof
of this than the Passover, and the terms of its institu-
tion. It was the most expressive of all the Old
Testament sacrifices, and its aim was to deliver the
House — *' A lamb for a house." " Then Moses called
for all the elders of Israel and said unto them, Draw
out and take a lamb according to your families and

kill the passover And it shall come to pass

when your children will say to you. What mean ye
by this service ? that yc shall say. It is the sacrifice of
the Lord's passover, who passed over the houses of the
children of Israel m Egypt when he smote the
Egyptians, and delivered our houses." — Ex. xii.,
21-26. The houses were saved by the believing act
of the head in sprinkling the door-posts with blood
according to the commandment of the Lord, Le., the
faith of the head took the blood of the slain lamb and
sprinkled the door-posts, and the destroying angel
passed over those houses, and even the unconscious
babe was saved by the father's faith. ' ^ ;'

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FAMILY LIFE.

The passover is a great symbolic picture of the
Gospel, for God works ever in the same way and
through the same instrumentality. Christ is now our
passover, and the Saviour of our home — the lamb is
still for the house — and the believing head must
sprinkle its blood on the door-posts of his home ;
and now, as surely as then, the Angel of Death will
pass over it, and, as in the case of the Philippian
jailor, this act will not only save himself, but also his
house.

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HEREDITY IN THE SPHERE OF FAITH.

Who can doubt the law of heredity that is pressing
to the front just now for consideration in the scien-
tific world — the principle by which the good or evil
in us becomes the heritage of our children ? Physical
constitution, disposition, innate tendencies, the mental
and moral type of the sire become those of the son.
This seems to be a comparatively new truth in science,
and she is making much ado about the discovery of
it. But it is an old truth in theology, which we have
been preaching since preaching began, and it has met
many a sneer from the savants of science. But now
they have changed front, and declare that the preacher
has been speaking the truth when he said that " God
visits the iniquities of the fathers upon the children";
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FA MIL V LIFE.

151

will likely show itself as a tendency in the other, and
that natural laws are God's decrees. We do not need
the testimony of science to ..onfirm this article of our
faith, which is asserted on Divine authority. We
simply tell a class of philosophers that there are other
lessons they might learn with advantage from the
same inspired authority, if they would only take time
to think this possible.

But this law of heredity is not confined to man's
physical or moral nature. Who doubts that there is
such a law of organic connection between parents and
children in the spiritual realm ? And that the law of
the Spirit of life is such that the faith of the former
will be propagated in the latter? And when under
reHgious training this does occur, it is no surprise to us,
but just what God's word has taught us to expect,
that for many years the life and character of the
parents will flow into those of the child. This repre-
sentative principle 1. s even a wider application in
the publi«^ characters of Adam and Christ, owing to
which the .-^ i of the first Adam has come upon the
whole humai family; and the obedience of Christ —
the second Adam — is sufficient to save all who do not
reject Him. ** By one man's disobedience many were
made sinners ; so by the obedience of one shall many
be made righteous." Both sin and grace reign by
one.

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ALL HEIRS TOGETHER OF THE SAME PROMISE.

The aim of all Christian nurture is to claim the
Home for Ciu'ist, and the first question is, How do
you regard your children ? Do you think of them as
being of the devil, and unsaved ? Or, as the children
of the Church, who are being trained into their holy
profession ? Do you class them with the ungodly,
and strangers to the covenants of promise, or as being
heirs of the same promise with yourselves ? Do you
live with your children, and for them, as if some day
they may possibly be converted ; or are they the
lambs of the flock already, with the seal of faith upon
them? In short, are they Christ's or the devil's?
The settlement of this point will determine our
relations to them, as well as our treatment, and our
expectations of them.

We know how Abraham looked upon the members
of his family, for the Bible tells us. Whatever spiritual
promise was given to him he regarded it as belonging
to his children as well ; and so he lived with his sons
Isaac and Jacob, as Jieirs ivith him of the same promise.
Not the father alone, but the family were included in
the family covenant. So God not only permits, but
commands this still in the New Testament economy,
where parents and children live together in the home
as heirs of the same promise.

The education of their children, and their training

FAMIL V LIFE.

153

in the faith of Israel, was binding on every parent,
and the home became the centre of religious teaching
and worship. The parent is a priest in his own home,
and the concrete form of the Gospel to the child, and
a living epistle to be read daily; and all this comes
as an influence, an atmosphere, and an inspiration,
rather than as a dogma of technical instruction. A
child can be trained in any way, and to any creed ;
and proper training determines its future, and shapes
the child's feelings, words, character, his life and
destiny. With the Divine blessing on his labours, a
parent can make his child do, and be, what he ought
to be and do ; and every parent is false to his mission
and work who overlooks and neglects this. It is a
sad thing to give our children the heritage of Cain
and drive them out from the presence of the Lord,
and number them among aliens and outcasts, till they
learn to believe us, and act according to the character
we have given them, and run the dark and downward
road for which we have prepared tbem.

Judah said to his father, " Send the lad with me, I
will be surety for him." So Christian parents are the
sureties before God for their children, to train them
for God. In baptism the parent says, " Send the
child with me I will be surety for him. If I bring
him not unto thee, and set him before thee, then let
me bear the blame forever." The thought of many

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a Christian mother as she looks upon her first-born
child has been interpreted by Hannah. Looking
from her child to the Lord who was above and over
all, she said in the devoutness of her heart, " For this
child I prayed ; and the Lord hath given me my
petition which I have asked of Him." Among all
the assurances that cheer and strengthen us, there are
no hopes brighter, or sweeter, than the full persuasion
that the same blessed bonds encircle the /lome ; that
parents and children, even while sojourning and
dwelling in tents, are heirs by promise of that better
country, and children of our Father's House — in
short, heirs together of the same promise. We bring
the lambs as a part of the flock, and put all under the
Shepherd's loving care, believing He will fulfil His
promise. And our prayers to Him. breathe the spirit
of loving trust, and of longing desire. " O when wilt
thou come unto me, I will walk within my house
with a perfect heart." And surely there is no truth
that shines forth more clearly from Scripture than
this, that God desires to be known and enjoyed as
the God of the families of Israel. This is His own
distinct promise, " I will be the God of all the families
of Israel, and they shall be my people." — Jer. xxxi. i.

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155

PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITY.

But the character of the young is not irrespective
of the care, nor independent of the character of the
parents themselves, who must be careful to be them-
selves all that they desire their children to be, for
they learn by example rather than by precept. Of
John the Baptist it is said, " For he shall be great in
the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine
nor strong drink ; and he shall be filled with the
Holy Ghost even from his mother's womb." But this
character was not to come to John by magic, for
cause and effect were linked together here as they
always are. Who were the parents of this child ?
And what was their character? They were both
righteous before God, and the child of such parents
was just what might have been expected ; growing
up in such a home and surrounded by such an atmos-
phere. In nature, like begets like. But the God of
nature is also the God of grace that works by the
same law — the faith that was in thy grandmother,
and in thy mother, and now in thee also. There is an
heredity of faith and grace, as there is of consumption
and scrofula. Great faith does great things, and it is
everything to have come of a godly stock, and to be
the seed of the righteous. The wise King has said,
" Train up a child in the way he should go, and when
he is old he will not depart from it." Prov. xxii., 6.

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Scripture is explicit as to what that way is, " The
way of the Lord, the way of His steps, the way of
peace, walking in His ways, the way of holiness, the
way of life, the new and living way along which all
the redeemed have walked." It is nothing short of
training them up in Christ, for He is the way to the
Father. But then it is asked, Does this promise hold
true? We have so many failures as to cast doubt on
the future. But when failures occur let us look for
an explanation in our faulty methods, and not in the
Divine promise.

The home, as much as the State, requires proper
authority and rule ; without this all will become
anarchy and confusion. God saw that Abraham
would command his household and his children after
him. Family government is much talked about, little
understood, and yet how necessary ! A home will
soon be destroyed, unless there is constant, careful
discipline, strong, decided rule. But family govern-
ment is not all in the rod ; much less is it mere arbi-
trary authority, or the reign of brute force. Many a
harsh, cruel father storms about his house, threatens
and thrashes, and makes his home a bear garden, and
calls this family government. They are as cruel to
their children as the heathen, and mistake this for the
nurture and admonition of the Lord, which is always
gentle, tender, loving. There must be wise authority,

FAMIL Y LIFE,

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for it is a false liberty that would do as the elder
Mills did with his child — omit all religious training lest
the mind of the lad should be biased in any par-
ticular way. But to leave the mind and heart with-
out culture is to prepare the soil for weeds, and every
noxious growth. Father and mother are more than
advisers, they are clothed by God with a measure of
authority to be lovingly and believingly exercised.

THE SPIRIT OF THE HOME.

Parents and children are closely knit together in
the bonds of the Gospel, and the obligations are
mutual. Parents are to bring up their children in the
nurture and admonition of the Lord ; and children
must honour their father and mother, and obey them
in the Lord. The children must obey, and the parents
must prove themselves worthy of this obedience; and
then the home will become the true nursery for those
plants of our Heavenly Father's planting.

How tender and pathetic are all the scenes in
Christ's life where little children appear, and it was
his touching regard for them that clothed those scenes
with beauty and pathos. Not only did Jesus know
all that was in a father's and a mother's heart, but he
sank new wells of love and tenderness in the heart of
humanity ; and the eye of Christ first appreciated the
true worth of childhood, and sought to fill the home

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with the grace of the Gospel, that its truths might h*e
on the hearts of the young as the dew-drops He on
the lilies of Esdraelon, and all blight and corrupting
influences be kept from their opening minds.

In the natural world everything depends on the
atmosphere. Is it pure, or miasmatic and poisonous ?
There can be no health in a polluted air. In the
neighbourhood of the coal mines of Plngland the
sheep are as black as the coal, and for miles around
everything is polluted. So is it with the homes of
our people. The atmosphere that fills some is pure,
transparent, and healthful as the breath of mountain
air ; while in others it is poisoned by vanity, worldli-
ness, greed, envy, Pharisaism and uncharitablcness.
In some the spirit is noble, generous, earnest, tender
and pure ; but in others there is something low, mean,
narrow, and suspicious about them. The atmosphere
here, as surely as in the natural world, will determine
the kind of growth. Tell me the spirit of your home,
and I will tell you the character of your children.

It is not among the outward and sensuous that the
chief agencies in moulding character are to be found.
Men are most influenced by silent, unseen forces, for
health or poison is in the air we breathe. The spirit
of the home, its moral tone and temper, and not its
formal lessons, or dogmatic authority, will mould its
members. It is by the atmosphere we silently breathe

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159

that our character and conduct are determined, rather
than by any technical rules and regulations. The
best authority is an influence felt as \i coming from
the very presence of the Saviour Himself. In some
places young life is as sure to be blighted, as a tender
plant would be frost-bitten, if set out in the night air
of January ; while ovher homes arc sweet, hopeful,
reverential, and loving, where the children grow in
freshness of spiritual life and beauty, and Jesus looks
upon such homes as the very garden of spices.

How fortunate we have been, if we have grown up
in a home where there was no dulling atmosphere, no
cold criticisms, no heartless fault-finding, no mean
insinuations, or morose authority, but happily only
a bright, cheerful, healthful influence. How happy
those homes,where all needless asperities are smoothed
down, the home that knows no supercilious distrust,
or mutually estranged feelings, and whose members
are all knit together in love. And where our chief
aims are religious, why is it not more common to
communicate one with another, that it may be said,
" Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to
another, and the Lord hearkened and heard ?"

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A lamb for a house. — Ex. xii., 3.

■But as for me and my house, we will serve the T^ord.

— Joshua xxiv., 15.

And thou shalt teach them tl'ligently unto thy children and shalt talk
'of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by
the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. —
Deut. vi., 7.

Those tilings which are revealed belong unto us and to our children
for ever, that we may do all the words of this law. — Deut. xxix., 29.

FAMILY RELIGION,

The Home is God's great nursery, where the plants
of our Heavenly Father a^e to grow till such time as
He transplants them. The family is the oldest insti-
tution, and the most fundamental. Keep the home
pure, and all will be safe, but let it become corrupt,
and both Church and State will totter to their fall.
The home being the foundation of society, God has
made the training of their children binding on the
parents. " And thou shalt teach them diligently unto
thy children, and shall talk of them when thou sittest
in thy house, and when thou walkest by the way, and
when thou liest down, and when thou risest up." But
in our day all this is delegated to others, and a
teaching class in the Sabbath School sets the father
free. He has given up the moral and spiritual culture
of his family to strangers, and retains merely the
business affairs of the firm, and continues to control
the finance department. But in family religion the
father is the priest, and is primarily responsible for
the character of the home, and the Godly upbringing
of the children.

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FAMILY RELIGION.

NECESSITY OF PERSONAL CONSECRATION.

The parents themselves — father and mother — must
be what they would have their children to be, and
exercise an influence in their home, not through bare
authority, the fear of the rod, or formal precept, but
rather by breathing an atmosphere from their life and
example. The true formula of family training is not
" Do as I tell you," but " Do as I do." Joshua realized
this fully when he solemnly resolved to consecrate
his home to the Lord ; he knew that first of all he
must consecrate his own life, and so he iliought of
himself ^vst — '''As for me'' He knew that the father
would be the model after whic . the children would
take pattern, and that his own life lived in the home
was to be the gracious influence in all home training.
In too many instances the father turns all spiritual
responsibility over to the mother, and everything is
left to her as being most with the children ; and the
responsible head will not as much as lighten the bur-
den by sharing it. He attends to the worldly con-
cerns, and she to the religious. But in all true home
religion the father should realize his chief place as
the house-bond (husband), and be himself the first
meridian for all after measurements ; the prime mover
and influence in Christian nurture. Religion, in the
first instance, must be realized as a personal matter,
and then as a sacred trust for others. The chief

FAMIL V RELIGION.

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responsibility rests with the head of the home, and
the fatlier must begin with himself, and train through
the influence of his own life. He must first give him-
self to God, and then bring his children with him, and
learn to pray as David prayed — *' Thou Lord God
knowest thy servant, therefore let it now please thee
to bless the house of thy servant."

Without personal consecration we would despair of
any true fruits, for it is only as we feel deeply our-
selves, tha,: we can ever hope to make others feel.
We must ourselves be in the way along which wc
would seek to lead others. We must be able to say
to our children " Come" and not " GoT " Come with
us and we will do thee good for the Lord hath spoken
good concerning Israel." We will speak to others in
vain, unless they first see the fruits of faith in our own
lives. And the healthiest and most powerful influence
in every home is the atmosphere of love and of the
fear of the Lord, which father and mother breathe
around them. If our homes arc to be for the Lord,
and our children to grow up as plants, v/e must, like
Joshua, say — " As for me," and then we shall next be
able to pledge our home — " And mv house, we luiii
scrv the Lord!'

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THE CONSECRATION OF THE HOME.

Personal religion must be followed by family
religion. "As for me," must be followed hy '' And
my house'' The one bound to, and naturally follow-
ing the other ; this is according to the will and
arrangements of God. At this point many professed
Christian parents fail. They imagine that the religion
and welfare of their home depend on the will of God,
exercised arbitrarily, and not through their instru-
mentality. Forgetting that here, as surely as any-
where else, cause and eff'ect are linked together. The
Divine order is that the head stands for, and repre-
sents his house — "me and my house": the faith of
the children depending on the faith of the father, and
both linked together in strong and gracious bonds.
This is a principle '"hat runs through all God's deal-
ings, and is one of the commonplace truths of the
Bible.

Joshua felt that he stood for his fam.ily as well as
for himself, and he so declared it — " me and my house,
ive will serve the Lord." All were to be united in the
same worship, and all engaged in the same service.
The religion was to be family religion, and the head
to bo responsible for the whole. It was the same
with the ark which Noah built by faith; it was for the
saviuL- of his house, and not for himself alone. The
New Testament teaches ihat the father's f .'.. ." r^^

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FAMILY RELIGION.

167

his house, and this agrees with the Old Testament.
" I have seen thee riijhteous before mc, come thou
and all thy house into the ark": "thou, and thy son,
and thy son's son : thou and the children which God
hath given thee : the faitli that was in thy grand-
mother, and in thy mother, and now in thee also."
Here is the law of spiritual evolution. The new
springs from the old ; hence there is progress ; and
the old is linked to the new ; there is therefore con-
tinuity. Grace was designed to pass from sire to son,
and link families and generations together, and not
to be the religion of separate units.

Home-life — family religion — is much cared for and
emphasized in all the dispensations of the Divine
dealings. We say these earnest words to newly
married people : " In setting up a home of yor.r own,
let it be your first and highest aim to bring Christ
into it, and this will sweeten all its joys, and sanctify
all its sorrows, far more than if you had the finest
furniture, and most fashionable decorations, that ever
adorned a dwelling. That home is happy where the
Saviour is the chief attraction, and all the little children
are growing up in His nurture, and are all under the
Good Shepherd's care. Let the grace of Christ's
presence be enjoyed by the household, and then yours
will be, not a mere dwelling-place, a residence, but
truly a home — a home for your heart's affections, and

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its most sacred exercises. How Christ longed to be
invited, and how he loved to come into the homes of
men when he lived with us on the earth ! And he has
the same affection for them still, and he will come
most gladly to-day when welcomed. Worship him
in your Jionie as well as in your heart."

FAMILY RELIGION MUST BE PRACTICAL.

Joshua affirmed that both he and his house would
serve the Lord. Our life is a service, for his people
are redeemed in order to serve him in the liberty
and with all the joy of children — purged from our
dead works to serve the Liviiig God. T1 's lesson is
brought out clearly in the demand God made upon
Pharaoh — " Let my people go that they may serve
me," We desire not simply to be saved from pains
and penalties, but to be enabled and led to serve God
with a true heart and a willing mind ; and to learn
to do gfjod to all as we have r)pportuin"ty, and
especial!}' tr) serve i\]P household </f faith. Too
many of Christ's professed f/;llowers are ^cifish and
self-indulgent. Their chief thought is, What can we
get? How can we be made happy? They are seeking
their own case, comfort, and cvemption*^ from all ills.
They think religion is something to make them feel
well, and give them freedom from care, sorrow and
pain. They would like their life to be made easy,

FAMILY RETJGIOX.

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soft, smooth, and be dropped into the promised land
without the necessity of marching through the wilder-
ness. They would like to be put into a glass-case for
safe preservation, or, lifted up, as in a spiritual balloon,
with all toil and danger far below.

Such people forget that life is for service, and not
for self-indulgence, and that those alone shall wear
the crown who have been faithful unto death. They
overlook the fact that God deserves and claims the
service of a free, loving, and redeemed people : and
that every true life is one that is helpful to others.
Salvation is not all: " How much can we get, but also
how much good can we do ; and every true servant
(i\ iii/' hovd offers himself on the altar of his faith.
With too many it is not — ** Lord, what would'st Thou
have me to do ? " But, " Lord, what am I to rain bv
this service? What u-ill I get by obedience?" Their
ideal is not Tesuts going about doing good, but,
" Lord, I deserve more at Thy hands than this man :
give me more. ' In short, not what can I do, but what
can be done for me.

Our faith embraces a salvation from sin ; this, how-
ever, is onl)' a part, and not the whole of it. Another
equally necessarv' part is service — a consecrated home
rejoicing in the salvation of Christ, and going forth to
serve Him, as being His, and not their own. When
Pharaoh \'ielded to the Lord's demand he said, " Go,

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yc, serve the Lord, and let your little ones ^,^0 with
you." All the blessings of God's salvation come to a
man's house, that as a family they may serve the Lord.
The characteristic of heaven is that they serve him
day and night in his temple. And our life on the
earth should be after the same copy; for the best way
of enjoying God is to work for him, and the only
crown to be worn, or that is worth wearing, is given
to those who are faithful unto death. And one of the
best and most effective spheres for Christian useful-
ness is our own home, and no labour brings in speedier
returns, or furnishes richer results. What a noble
example Abraham furnishes to us of fidelity in the
home ! " I know him that he will command his
children and his household after him, and they shall

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that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which
he hath spoken of him." — Gen. xviii., 19.

FAMILY RELIGION MUST 1?E OPEN AND CONFESSED.

We are to let our light shine before men, and not
put our candle under a bushel. Christ's disciples
hold his gifts as a sacred trust on behalf of others,
and not for mere selfish ends. And never, as the
head of a home, be ashamed of the family altar, or
neglect to offer the morning and evening sacrifice.
When Joshua determined for his home as he did for

FAM/L Y RELIGION.

171

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himself, it was a grand public confession before
assembled thousands. A crisis had arisen such as
tries men's faith. Many were apostatizing, and so it
was a time of solemn decision and resolve, but Joshua
never hesitated to let it be known on what side he
stood, or where the loyalty of his heart rested. And
so he confessed not only for himself, but for the house-
hold, and pledged them all — " Me and my house ; we
will serve the Lord."

Sometimes we are afraid to let it be known that
we honour God in our family. We have known those
who dispensed with the usual family worship, when
gay visitors were being entertained as guests. They
lowered their colours and for the time being deserted
their Captain. In this way the atmosphere becomes
chilled, and the tender plants are injured. Desertion
is common, else the solemn admonition would never
have been given with such earnest emphasis: "If
any man is ashamed of me and of my words, of him
shall I be ashamed. But whosoever shall confess me
before men, him will I also confess before my Father
and His holy angels."

An eminent lawyer, on one occasion, had gone ta
attend court, and was staying for the iiight with a
plain farmer, a former acquaintance. TJie farmer w'as
a God-fearing man, who every evening observed
family worship, but was a man of no education. And

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FAMILY RELIGION.

as the time for worship drew near, he felt inclined to
omit it, as he shrank from reading and praying before
a man of learning, who knew so much more than him-
self I^ut the words of Christ sounded in his ears —
*' Whosoever shall be ashamed of me," etc. So, with
much fear and trembling, he took the book and had
family worship as usual. The whole sccpe was
primitive but solemn. The lawyer reasoned in this
way, " Here is a man discharging a duty that costs
him much self-denial ; it was evident he shrank from
the ordeal ; yet his sense of duty led him to do what
he would far rather have omitted. Here is a man
with whom the realities of religion are supreme. He
feels as I do not feel, and enjoys what I do not enjoy."
So he pondered the whole matter over — the quiet,
homely, earnest, heart-felt service, all so real to the
family. When the lawyer went home, he talked it all
over with his wife ; they had children of their own for
whom they felt anxious ; and it ended in his setting
up a family altar in his own home, and resolving like
Joshua, " Others may do what seemeth them good,
but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord."
Many parents w^a it to have a consecrated home,
one where they can welcome and enjoy the Saviour —
a home for God to dwell in with their family. This
is often the separate desire of father and mother, and
yet they have never conversed freely to one another

FA MIL V KEI.lGIOiW

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on the subject. St.ant^e to say, they feel more under
restraint to one another, than toward complete
strangers ; and so they h ive never spoken together
of what they both have felt strongly — the need of
family religion. Let this barrier exist no longer, and
learn to talk freely to each other of what concerns
you both. If hitherto ye have not honoured God in
your family, and if your children are old enough, talk
the whole matter over with them, and tell them that,
depending on God's grace, you intend to set up a
family altar, and say to them, " From this day we will
serve the Lord." There is nothing that unites a home
like common service, and nothing that will cause the
members to love one another like the bond of a com-
mon love to Christ.

INSTRUCTION MUST BE FROM THE HEAR 7.
Parents are commanded to teach their children ;
this, however, must never degenerate into a dry
routine, a dull and dreary task, but something that
issues from the heart, full of sympathy with the truths
imparted, for it is only that which comes from the
heart, that will in turn reach and influence the heart.
The doctrines we are to teach our children, the love
we long to have them cherish toward the Saviour,
their reverence for His word, and obedience to His
law — must all be in our own hearts first, and then, out

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of the abundance of the heart the mouth will speak ;
for we can only teach effectively what we feel and
value, and not simply whit we have heard, or know
by rote. Heart work is easy work, and it alone is
effective in moral culture. Not till our own heart is
filled with love to God, and we are deeply interested
in the training of our children for Him, will it become
a labour of love to us, and not an ungracious task.
If our message to our children be mere hearsay and
not personal conviction, it will not go far or do much.
We believe, and therefore speak, is the proper order.
If we are to do any good at all, we must feel the
truth we desire to impart, and therefore we are told
that, as a preliminary to teaching, we must love the
Lord our God with all our heart. " And these words
that I command thee this day sJiall be in thy heart,
and thou shalt teach them to thy children," and when
the truth lives in our heart it will bud forth in theirs,
and all home duties, and home life, and home religion,
instead of being a weariness to us, will become an
inspiration, a sanctuary to the heart, and a sweet rest
to our souls. A sense of duty, a feeling of responsi-
bility, the fear of consequences, may all be motives,
but chief of all is love to the Lord Jesus Christ ; and
to a heart that believes, obeys, and loves the Saviour,
all work will be easy and every duty a pleasure, and
the home will become the most sacred temple.

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2. This work requires diligence as well as devotion.
*' Thou shalt teach them diligently to thy children.''
Anything that enlists our affections, secures our dili-
gence without a grudge. In the natural husbandry,
the husbandman is represented as rising up early,
watching, working, and waiting anxiously for the
fruits of all liis pains. So in the spiritual world, it
is the hand of the diligent that maketh rich also.
Christian parents, the trust committed to you is most
sacred, betray it not ! The work of training your
children for Christ is great and necessitous, and must
be regarded as the work of your life. Sow with a
diligent hand the seeds of truth in the rich soil of
their young hearts : water the seed sown with your
prayers : and no labour will bring you in larger
returns. In this sphere alone you should know that
your labour will not be in vain. And if success in
our ordinary calling demands diligence, how much
more watchful and careful ought we to be in that
work on which the peace of our homes, and the
spiritual welfare of our children, depend ! Here it
holds true also . " There is that scattcreth and yet
increaseth, and there are those who withhold more
than is meet and it tendeth to poverty." And there
is no faniine like the famine in a home where the
Lord is not known, and where none of his gracious
influences are enjoyed. __„_._-

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176

FAMILY RELIGION.

It is often said "We just live for the sake of our
children ; all our plans and expectations are on their
behalf." But in this we surely do not include their
temporal, to the exclusion of their sp'"itual welfare.
To preserve our home for the Lord and train our
children for him, is the one great work of life that
requires line upon line, precept upon precept, here a
little and there a little. " Thou shalt talk of them
when thou sittest in thy house, and when thou walkest
by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou
risest up." — Deut. vi.,/. The religious culture of our
home is not to be a mere by-job in the family,
taken up at uncertain intervals, and emphasized at
odd hours ; but day and night, late and early, through
cloud and sunshine, an atmosphere of diligence,
sincerity and trust, is to pervade the home. On week
days and Sabbaths, in labour and rest, the one aim,
and the one great work, is to bring up our children
in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

3. With the demands of our day-schools on our
children's time, with their overloaded curriculum, and
with home studies that exhaust all their energies, no
opportunity is given for religious studies through the
week. They are quite overtaxed as it is. And the
Church, not to be behind, has multiplied meetings and
services, and outside spheres of labour, so that home-
life has become a thing of the past. Father and child

FAMILY RELIGION.

177

are seldom in the home together, and are in danger of
not knowing each other when they meet on the street.
''You had better remain at home to-night," said a wife
to her husband, who was going out to yet another
meeting, "as I would like to introduce you to our own
children." "My dear," replied her husband, "I abomi-
nate all this excitement as much as any one, but I
cannot help it ; this living out-of-doors seems to be
in the air, and the Church herself has caught the
infection."

We greatly admired the old Sabbaths — but now
they are to us only a fond memory — with their morn-
ing service, where young and old met together for
the worship of God ; with the quiet evenings left for
home study, reading of the Scriptures, catechism ;
the familiar conversations on gospel themes — soft,
tender, loving words, — that made the things of grace
a permanent reality to the young. Evening service,
though now a necessity, is far from being an unmixed
good, for it brings with it many a drawback. There
is far too much preaching, and home instruction, and
family life too much neglected.

Our ideal Sabbath would be public worship in the
morning for young and old ; Sabbath school and
Bible-class instruction in the afternoon, where, again,
all ages should join ; and all the members of the
family at home together in the evening. This was

178

FAMILY religion:

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the way in Scotland for many generations, and the
world knows with what results. Now, they are multi-
plying their evening services as in other places, and
their young people are fast learning to know as little
about the Scriptures as they do elsewhere. " I have
heard an eminent business man in our city say," says
Prof Thompson, " that if he had his life to live over
again, he would most probably accumulate less wealth,
but his relations to his sons would be much more
intimate, and their characters very different." Nor
•would the boys have been the only gainers by such
■a parental training. The teacher would have been
taught also.

This is not the only father who has lived to regret
past remissness, and that things in the hom: would
be regulated very differently, had life to be lived over
again. But what Christian parent can say that he
has done all that it was possible for him to do for his
family ? Or that he has been as solicitous for their
spiritual, as he has been for their temporal welfare ?
Who among us all has felt, as he ought to have felt,
the full import of Christ's commands — " Feed my
lambs" — suffer the little children to come to me and
forbid them not? Who has responded with all loyalty
of heart to the demand — " Bring them up in the nur-
ture and admonition of the Lord " ?

If we had life's road to travel over again, we would

FAMIL Y RELIGION,

179

most likely change our course and seek to have fewer
rc-rets at the end for words unspoken, work undone,
and aims never truly realized. Lost opportunities
rebuke us all. But the past is beyond our recall, for
spilt water cannot be gathered up again. All that we
can do is, that depciding on Divine grace, we will
resolve to be more faithful in the future and train
up ou. children in the way they should go.

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THE HOME: WOMAN'S WORK IN THE

CHURCH.

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Let them show piety at home. — i Tim. v., 4.

Hannah said .... I will not go up till the child be weaned, and
then I will bring him that he may appear before the Lord and there
abide forever .... So the woman abode and gave her son suck until
she weaned him .... for this child I prayed : and the Lord hath
given me my petition which I asked of him. — i Sam. i., 22 — 27.

And Naomi took the child and laid it in her bosom, and became
nurse unto it. — Ruth iv., 16.

The young v/omen to lov» their husbands, to love their children.
. . . . Keepers at home. — Titus ii., 3 — 6.

I will, therefore, that the young women marry, bear children, guide
the house, give none occasion to the enemy to speak reproachfully. —
I Tim. v., 14.

But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the
man, but to be in silence. — i Tim. ii., 12.

Let yr)ur women keep silence in the Church and if they will

learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home : for it is a shame
for women to speak in the church. — i Cor. xiv., 34, 35. ,

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THE HOME

WOMAN'S WORK IN THE
CHURCH.

Many a sweet domestic scene is portrayed in the
Word of God, and brief but precious sketches are
given us of many a noble woman ; while much is said
of her power for both good and evil. Chief among
them all, is that vivid, life-like home-scene at Beth-
lehem, which stands out in the simple narrative of
the Gospel more clearly than the pencil of a Raphael
could ever give it. It is the picture of a wonderful
home-scene, in which both earth and heaven arc
interested, because it is the meeting-place and bond
between them.

It cannot be denied that the tendency in the
Church for some time has been to neglect home-life
and home training, and to cultivate an outside,
ostentatious piety, found largely at the street corners,
to be seen of men — "Verily they have their reward."
But in Oider to conserve the moral forces we possess,
and gain others, we must return to the good old
paths, and anchor the hearts of our people around
the home, for this is the foundation of all moral

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/rOJ///.V'5 ^rcPA'A' //V ?'//£ CHURCH,

Stability, and wc touch the root of the social tree
when we touch family life. And if family training
is neglected, religious life will wither up by the roots.
There is ground to fear that this garden of the Lord
is not as carefully cultivated as it was in former years,
and that tares arc being sown in soil, once largely
occupied by the good seed of the kingdom. Our
wise and good forefathers of the Presbyterian Church
in Scotland and Ireland knew the value of family
training, and the great need of having the young well
grounded in Bible knowledge. The long, earnest
diets of catechising on Sabbath afternoon or evening
are well remembered by the generation now fast pass-
ing away. And the solidity of character, their sturdy
independence, their shrewd sagacity and indomitable
perseverance ; their integrity and fear of the Lord,
that have given them a name wherever they have gone,
were more largely due to their careful training in
Bible knowledge than to any other cause. And,
while the father was the priest of the family, it was
generally the mother that diffused the atmosphere of
Christian influence in the home. And it was her
more constant oversight and watchfulness, her loving,
careful dealing, that generally stamped the character
and moulded the life of the young, and sent forth
men and women fully furnished in mind and heart
to do their duty by the will of God.

lyOMAN'S IVOR A' hV THE CHURCH.

185

THE NEED OF THOROUGH BIBLICAL TEACHING.

All acknowledge this need, and are loud in its
praise, and yet the practical steps are not taken to
sccu ':^ it. We fear that, in many instances, the two
grand text-books of former days are less popular
now. Neither the Bible, nor the Shorter Catec/tisin is
either so commonly, or so wisely used as when each
home was a Sabbath-school. Few, if any, of our
young people, get the solid instruction they once got
in doctrinal subjects. What the Church requires
most of all to-day is more thorough, downright,
earnest teaching, both in our families and in Sabbath-
schools. At no time was more solid instruction
given, and a surer basis laid of moral and religious
development, than when intelligent teachers in the
Sabbath-school, and especially faithful parents at
home, made the shorter catechism their text-book
of systematic theology, and the treasury of Bible
instruction.

A change has come over the Church, and we feel
confident that the International Lessons are, in part,
the cause of what we all deplore. But, while accept-
ing fully what is good in the latter, there is no need
for giving up the former. Let us rather combine
what is good in both ; and, therefore, we urge, most
earnestly, a return to the good old way of teaching
thoroughly the shorter catechism as the grandest

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WOMAN'S WORK IN THE CHURCH.

epitome of Bible-truth ever made. And if it has not
the prominence it once had in our schools, this be-
comes a stronger reason why \vc should make it all
the more prominent in our homes. A Presbyterian
Church cannot live without Bible instruction. Our
very existence depends on an intelligent acquaint-
ance with the Word of God. And the best time,
and place, and help for this noble work, is the
catechism taught to the young by earnest. God-fearing
parents, ;vho feel the full responsibility of their
charge — " Bring them up in the nurture and admoni-
tion of the Lord."

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PARENTAL RESl ONSIBILITY.

We know that no field left uncared for will ev^er
run to ivheat, but, in every case, to iveeds. So, no
untaught, untrained, uncared-for family will ever
become Presbyterian in their belief. To produce
such fruits as have grown for generations with such
profusion and happy results m Scotland and the
North of Ireland, demands intelligent Christian
culture, for it does not come by chance, nor is it ever
found in neglected homes. That form of belief,
known as Presbyterian, which we hold to be the
purest form of New Testament worship, both in
doctrine and polity, can be produced only by earnest
training, for it is not a natural growth in the depraved

WOMAN'S WORK LV THE CHURCH.

187

human heart. It v/ill invariably be lound — as many
instances in every age go to show — that the children
who grow up in worldly, careless, prayerlcss, catechism-
less homes, will, naturally, degenerate to some lower
type of religious life, where they will be mere at home
than under Presbyterian teaching, if they do not go
to swell the great army of the unwashed, un-Church-
goii ; heathen that abound throughout our land, and
especially in our towns and greatc centres of popula-
tion. As a Church, we must either train our children
or die. And if we nave not religion in the home, we
will not have it long in the peiv. And yet many
liomes are criminally neglected by those who have
taken the most solemn vows to teach their children
by both precept and example. There is a sharply-
marked tendency among parents to turn over the
whole matter of the religious instruction of their
children to the Sabbath-school. And if our schools
are made the substitute for home training, they will
prove to be hinderances, and not helps in preparing
the way of the Lord. " The curse of the Lord is in
the house of the wicked, but He blesseth the habita-
tion of the just." — Prcv. iii., 33. And nere we come
upon .^. .,-...

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188

WOMAN'S WORK IN THE CHURCH.

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woman's true sphere of work and influence

in the church.

While elders and deacons seem to have been the
only two classes formally set apart officially to the
work of the Church, they were not the only classes
that worked for the Church's upbuilding. In
Rom. xvi., Paul greets both men and women whom
liC regarded as co-workers ; and at the very head of
the list stands the name of Phoebe, a devout Christian
woman and active worker in the Church of Cenchrea.
Priscilla and Aquila — a married couple — are also
named, but the wife's name preceding that of her
husband as being — what many wives are to-day —
the more earnest and active worker of the two ;
while he makes mention of many other godly women
— true help-meets in the Lord's work.

In the Church to-day many new spheres of labour
are opening up which wom.en can occupy with great
advantage, and bear noble testimony to the Lord.
It is an obvious fact, that were it not for women who,
like their sisters in the olden times love to linger
around the cross, visit the sepulchre of our Saviour,
or minister to him in loving deeds, many of our
prayer-meetings might be closed, our Sabbath-£;chools
would have few teachers, many of our Church organi-
-zations would soon cease to have a name, our congre-
gational life would wither away, our social meetings,

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IVO MAN'S IVOR A' IN THE CHURCH.

189

mission work, district visiting, in short, Christian
enterprise in every department, would be suspended.
Unless woman's instinctive sagacity, keener percep-
tions, and tenderer sympathies peculiarly fitted her
for nursing the sick, and visiting the afflicted — always
a large part of Christian work. Meanwhile, women's
missionary associations promise to develop greatly
the energy and efficiency of the Church in this great
department of labour, and many noble women are
now going out to the foreign field to tell of Jesus and
the Resurrection. We rejoice in all their Christian
activity, and wish it multiplied a thousandfold. We
regard all this as an omen for good, and would not
say a word that would detract from its importance.

THE HOME HER MAIN SPHERE OF INFLUENCE.

Notwithstanding all this, we hesitate not to affirm
.hat it is in and through the fatnily, and home-life,
that woman's influence is to tell most powerfully in
the Church and on Society. This must ever be her
special and distinctive sphere of labour, and from this
centre the great moral forces are produced that will
move the world. While oi'en occupynig, with
efficiency and rich spiritual results, other sp'^eres
and lines of Christian labour, still, her influence is -
mainly and most healthily through her family and
in her home.

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190

7r(9J//iA^'6' /FOA'A' LV THE CHURCH.

Pious wives and mothers, quiet, retiring, unosten-
tatious, of large, practical common-sense, such as we
suppose the cousins Mary and Elizabeth to have
been ; or Martha and Mary, of Bethany — women
\vhose names may never be mentioned when public
affairs are discussed, who are never dreamt of when
conventions are held, whose names are never thought
of when a class of modern so-called Christian
workers are eulogized and occupy the front benches,
invariably absent from every mutual adulation
society, where self-constituted saints meet to purr
over one another, — these are the ones of whom
the Master says, ' Well done ! " W.ise, loving, earnest,
gentle Vv'omen, like all those in the Gospel story,
the aroma of whose memory fills the Church, as the
evening glory crowns the hill-tops. They are women
who would shrink from publicity in all its forms, who
prefer going in the early morning, while it is yet dark,
to embalm the body of Jesus with the love of their
heart, and going before anyone is astir ; or, who
linger by the cross long after everyone else has gone
home. These are the Christian workers who labour
at the foundations that lie out of sight of public
inspection. Women like these, free from tattle, tale-
bearing, gossip in all its forms ; their hearts filled
with their own great, solemn purpose, but whose
womanly, decided Christian bearing is manifest and

WOMAN'S WORK IN THE CHURCH.

101

approved by all who know them ; women whose walk
is close with God, whose grace is diffused through
their home, who train their children in the fear of the
Lord, daily impressing upon them the sin of lying,
dishonesty, meanness of spirit, evil speaking, and the
need of forming a good, strong, Christ-like character ;
mothers whose daily care it is to make the home
a fitting place for the Master to visit, and where
he loves to come, do more for the kingdom of Christ
and the good of men than many who flaunt before
the public gaze, and who are ambitious of being
regarded as moral reformers.

What weighty admonitions the Apostle gives; and
though some think his advice is a little old-fashioned,
it is as much needed as ever, and, if taken, it would
work many blessed changes. — Titus iii., 3-5. Dread-
fully prosaic advice for this Nineteenth Century !
Why, there are nothing but common duties mentioned!
He allows no room for enterprise ! no recognition of
woman's rights in their modern sense ! " Love your
husbands ! love your children ! keepers at home !
discreet, chaste, etc ! " How dreadfully common-
place ! Not even a word about attending conven-
tions ! Probably the Apostle would have spoken
differently had he lived in this age of higher
education for women ! " That the women be in
behaviour as becometh the Gospel." ** Let the women

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192

lyOMAN'S IVORK AV THE CHURCH.

adorn themselves in modest apparel, and with good
works, as becometh women professing godliness."
He speaks of some who learn to be idle, wandering
about from house to house ; and not only idle, but
tattlers also, and busybodies, speaking things that
they ought not : " Let all such learn to guide the
house, and give no occasion to the adversary to speak
reproachfully."

The sins Paul pointed out are still common, and
the graces he inculcates need as careful cultivation
as ever. We cannot improve on Apostolic teaching,
and the fact that these virtues are the commonplaces
that cluster around home-life, makes them all the
more precious. Though nothing could fly more
directly in the face of modem tendencies than the
lessons contained in this brief paragraph, yet the
woman who follows Paul's advice is a true help-meet,
and a Christian worker in the noblest sense. Such
a woman cannot go anywhere without carrying a
benediction with her. According to the Divine
judgment, woman's best adorning is not the plaiting
of her hair, the wearing of gold or putting on of
goodly apparel, but good ivorks. These are the jewels
and adorning which give her beauty in the eyes of
both God and man. The pious Sarah, fit companion
for Abraham, the friend of God, the modest Rebecca,
the tender Rachel, the humble Ruth, the sweet wife

WOxMAN'S WORK IN THE CHURCH,

193

of Elkanah, the anxious Martha, the devout Mary,
the practical Dorcas — noble women, all, — these are
true workers in the vineyard of the Lord.

VALUE OF PERSONAL AND QUIET DUTIES.

One of the most blessed things we learn in the
Gospel is the value our Saviour puts on little thingSy
— the cup of cold water ; faithful in a few things, etc.
It is quality and not quantity Pie esteems. He asks
not hoiv muck we do, but hozv we do it. No deed,
even the smallest, is common that springs from a
heart wholly consecrated to Him. And if we would
bring a holy life to Christ, and offer Him the broken
and contrite spirit, we must be as careful of our Jire-
side duties, as we are of the duties of the sanctuary.

In our religious life, as in our social, we are apt to
conform to what is public, popular, and attended with
eclat. And yet the mightiest influences this world
has ever seen have proceeded from quiet souls, that
have, like some of the great forces in nature, been
nourished in secret. To be the means of giving an
impulse to some great man, as his teacher did to
Martin Luther. And no one knows when he does
his greatest service. As the flower dies when the
seed is forming, so, many yield the richest results
through those whom they have trained and taught
the ways of God. Obscure themselves, they have

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194

IVO.UAIV'S WORK LV THE CIWRCir.

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lived in their descendants. Jesse may be no great
figure in history, but David was, and the training of
David was a grand work for the Lord. Zechariah
and Zebedee were not large men when compared
with the two Johns — the Baptist and the Apostle.
Our best service does not consist in great works done
in public. Philip probably did his greatest service
when he preached a sermon to one hearer in the
chariot, while he and the eunuch rode together.

All Christian workers must have the spirit of their
Master, and work as if their Saviour were standing
by their side and witnessing their works of faith and
labours of love. Like Him, too, v/e must learn to
do little things well ; for nothing is really little that
bears on man's life and destiny. Many can do the
great that fail in the little. Many are heroic when
the world is witnessing them and ready to shout
applause, who are cowards in the secret of their own
hearts. Because the ten talents have not been com-
mitted to us, we hide the one in a napkin. Peter
said he could die for his Master, but he could not
keep aivake for him. Never despise duty, however
small or obscure. Many seem to live and prepare
for one deed, speaking one word, or sending one
message. It seems a small contribution, but on the
scale of eternity it is mighty. That one deed, or
word, or message, may live in the memory and heart

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lyO MAN'S IVOR A' AV THE CHURCH.

195

of generations, and streams of blessing may flow
from that fountain opened through all the ages to
come.

John Newton was seven years old when his mother
died. All that he remembered of her was her pray-
ing for him with her hands on his head, and the tears
rolling down her earn st face. He always believed
his conversion was in answer to her prayers. Newton
was, in turn, instrumental in guiding the mind of
Cowper at a critical time of his spiritual history, and
his songs will cheer the Church during all the days
of her pilgrimage. Cowper, in turn, led Carey to the
Saviour. Carey went out to India, and his work
eternity alone will reveal. And all this wide stream
of blessing flows from the little fountain — an earnest
mother praying to the God of the covenant for her
darling boy — a mother of whom the world knows
nothing but this fact. But how much the world owes
to this mother ! and what encouragement to others
to go and do likewise ! ' ,

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AN OPPORTUNITY FOR ALL.

And who may not work for this Master? True,
the best and the noblest are unworthy to unloose the
latchet of Christ's shoes, yet a sinful woman may
wash His sacred feet. Personal merit may not touch
His shoe-latchet, but love may kiss His feet ; and

19G

WOMAN'S WORK AV THE CHURCH.

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the love that poured the ointment upon them was
more precious to Him than all the perfume of Araby
the Blest. Through the door of love who may not
enter His service and minister to Him ? And, though
He may have committed to your keeping but the one
talent, there is nothing your Saviour would have you
do for Him that He has not given you the means to
accomplish.

On the other hand, what compensation does a
woman make to society, who inflicts upon the public
a few hysterical addresses or crude sermonettes, but
robs it of its noble men and women, when, by her neg-
lect, she has allowed her home to go to confusion and
her children to grow up savages. " Woman's Rights "
is one of the stock phrases of our day. But the
attainment of these, in the sense in which some
women seem to understand the term, is the establish-
ment of baby's wrongs, and a blight on the public
',veal. God never calls any mother to leave her home
duties for outside work. Those who are freed from
such ties may engage in such work as their abilities
and conscience may prompt ; but every married
woman must find her chief sphere of labour largely
at home. She must retire gladly and lovingly into
Christ's inner Church, and occupy her precious hours
in the holy ministry of the home — that Church in the
house — which is often one of the sweetest sanctuaries

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WOMAN'S IVORh' IN THE CHURCH.

19:

on earth, whose sacredness has overshadowed us, and
which w • feel till the last day of life. As it has been
very pithily put, by a recent 'vriter, " Samuel was
not brought up on a ma's feeding-bottle, while his
mother went gallivanting o.f to Shiloh three limes a
year with Hannah." These were the days of repose
in homes ; so she looked after her nursling three
years at home. Give me a wise, loving mother in the
Christian home, training her children for the Lord,
and I will show you the true Christian worker, the
real home missionary. A home with Christ as its
centre, under the loving care of a wise. God-fearing
mother, and God and eternity alone can reveal the
extent of such a one's influence. And if this seems
to be a contracted sphere, ma):e it all the more
intense, as the lens gathers the scattered rays on one
bright focus.

" But surely you will make an exception of the
minister's wife 1" remarks someone at this point, she
must take the lead in all good works ! But why the
minister's wife more than any other Christian woman?
We affirm that that wife who makes the home of her
husband a scene of peace and joy, that guards his
precious hours from needless intrusion, that keeps all
tattle and gossip from his ears — the small insinuations
of smaller people — and sends him up to his pulpit
each Sabbath in good spirits, in good health, and

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WOMAN'S WORK IN THE CHURCH.

throws the sunshine of her own heart around all his
work, is doing most for his people, as well as for him-
self, whether they know it or not.

Woman's grand sphere of power is elsewhere, and
through other modes of working. In looking back
upon the history of the Church, and the many leading
men who have been instrumental in guiding her
movements, we find there is scarcely any of these
great men of God but had the help, the sympathy,
and co-operation of some warm-hearted, devout
female friend — a wife, a sister, a mother — who was
the inspiration and promoter of their great life-work.
We find mothers, with tears and prayers, dedicating
their sons to the service of the Gospel, and encourag-
ing them, to abandon their professions as lawyers,
litt&ate7trs, rhetoricians, and many a secular calling,
that they might follow Ch'ist in the preaching of his
truth. And these men of God were seconded and
strengthened in all noble endeavours and acts of self-
denial by some noble woman, whose heart was full of
the truth which she loved. Such was the niother of
Augustine, the wife of John Knox, the mother of the
Wesleys, the w'ife of David Livingstone, and many
another known only to the Great Task-Master, for
whom they were content to labour in secret. Verily
they shall not lose their reward. After the self-sacri-
fice of the Saviour, the sublimest self-denial and the

IVOATAX'S WORK /.V THE CHURCH.

100

purest love is that of a woman. There is nothing
on this earth more in sympathy with the Saviour and
His mission of salvation, than the heart of a woman
sanctified by His grace, and the Redeemer sees no
truer pattern of His own Hfe. Christian women !
well may you work earnestly for the Gospel of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Think of the great deliverance
it has wrought out for you, and the blessed influence
of that Gospel upon the social and moral condition
of woman. Separated from the sweet charities of
life, and the all-purifying power of the Gospel, what
burdens have your sisters not borne, and to what
degradation have they not been reduced ! But from
being the toy of man's pleasure, or the slave of liis
passions, the Gospel lifts woman up, and declares her
to be tnafi's helpmeet. And by the sweeter intuitions
of her heart, and the tenderer graces of her sensi-
bilities, she, in turn, smoothes the asperities of life,
and becomes the sweetener of earth's sorrows.

Anything that touches woman, touches the moral
life of the world. When the young women of a
place are giddy, frivolous, shallow', ignorant, and given
over to the vulgar display of cheap decorations, it
must prove a most deadly blight on the community.
On the contrary, where the young women arc
intelligent, sober-minded, chaste, lovers of good
things, a joy, a help, an inspiration, — as cheerful as

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ll^OJ/A.V'S IV^RK' IN THE CHURCH.

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the song of birds, and as pure as the opening flowers
of spring, — it is the richest benediction God -an send
a people. Our young men could not then afford to
be ninnies and nondescripts, occupying the medial
line between the sexes — mere clothes-pegs for men-
millinerv.

Women, if you could only feel, through one strong
impulse, one holy experience, your indebtedness to
the Gospel of Jesus Christ, you surely never could
encourage those tendencies to worldliness and frivolity
that so largely defeat the work of the Church.

The early ages were blessed with many such
women, noble examples of devotion and intense
earnestness, v/ho regarded it as their life-work to
inspire and second the heroic efforts of a husband, a
son, a brother, urging them to consecrate themselves
to the service of Christ. And in this world there is
no grander or wider sphere of influence.

Would that such devotion and loving service were
more common. For not till the last day, and the
doom of this world is sealed, shall it be known how
many of all those who swell the ranks of the
redeemed have been owing to the quiet, unostenta-
tious, earnest, humble efforts of God-fearing women,
whom the world never knew, and who never desired
that the world should know them.

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THE HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

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Thy holy child Jesus. — Acts iv., 27.

And he went down with them, and qpime to Nazareth, and was
subject unto them ; but his mother kept all these things in her heart.
And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God
and man. — Luke ii., 51, 52.

And he came to Nazareth, where /ie had been brought up, and, as his
custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood
up for to read. — Luke iv., 16.

Thy mother and thy brethren stand without desiring to speak with
thee. — Luke viii., 20.

For neither did his brethren believe in him. — John vii., 5.

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THE HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

The Gospel begins with the story of a family. It
is a wonderful home-scene—a father, a mother, and a
little babe are there ; and thus the New Testament
opens with a picture of idyllic purity which can never
lose its charm. No religion that begins thus, in the
very heart of humanity, could ever lose its character
or force. In that home,— type of all others,— we have
the grand unit of human life— the FAMILY. In that
quiet, peaceful home of Nazareth, the hopes of
humanity are cradled. Who can measure the blessed-
ness of any true home ? How much less this home,
where Joseph was itj guide and support, the home
which Mary sweetened by her presence, and into
which Jesus himself brought the very light and love
of Heaven. What a model for all our homes, where
the child grew in wisdom and stature, and in favour
with God and man — a home, simple, natural, con-
tented, pure.

The home of Nazareth ought to correct the insin-
cerities and artificial bondage of our times, and diffuse

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204

HO ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

a sweeter, healthier atmosphere around us, where
childhood and the dawn of life's morning may
brighten into the holy light of a mother's love and a
father's tender care. But woe be to that home from
whose sacred precincts all love and fondness, all
gentleness and the fear of the Lord have fled, and
where nothing is left but contention, peevishness,
distrust, and alienation of heart. And woe be to the
children that have such an environment ! Of all
scenes on earth, the Christian home comes nearest to
the bliss of Heaven, which is itself presented to us as
a home and a family gathering, freed from all care,
exempt from all sorrow, kept from all sin, the
children delivered from everything that can hurt or
disturb, and living in the light of the Father's face.
No place is nearer Heaven than the Christian home :
" Here we have the holiest altars, the wisest teachers,
the tenderest love, the sweetest graces, and the most
lastincf influences."

HIS INFANCY AND CHILDHOOD.
He was born as other little infants are born, lay in
His mother's arms in soft, sweet slumber; she fondled
Him on her knee, and pressed Him to her heart. He
awoke, and slept, and awoke again, and was nourished
like all other infants, and thus the gladsome years
passed by.

HO ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

205

From His infancy till Ke reached the age of twelve,
when the sole recorded incident of His boyhood is
given us, we have no history of His life. Those
wondrous years are covered by one statement —
" And Jesus increased m wisdom and stature, and in
favour with God and man." And Mary, His mother,
had much to ponder in her heart. What a perfect
mould the young life was cast in, to fill up the
symmetry of this x^tvine ideal ! " The grace of God
was upon him." What a warm," pure atmosphere to
breathe, and to be surrounded by ! What a blessed
life to live, and what a full, rich pattern of our own !
For the life which He lived in the flesh is the model
of the one we have to live now.

He was a child before He was a man, and had all
the experiences of a child. For the boy Jesus of the
Gospels was a real boy, as He was a'^terwards a most
natural man. He knew all the stages of growth, from
childhood to manhood, and had a babe's experience
of knowing nothing ; the child's, of knowing only a
little ; for He grew in wisdom as he grew in stature
— the universal necessity of development.

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The holy child Jesus was trained in a home of
pious refinement, though His parents were poor, and
throughout His life He bore the marks of that

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206

HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

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training which He received under Mary's roof. Mary
brought Him up. What a lesson is conveyed to all
mothers by the fact that Jesus was brought up by
His mother, who regarded this as her sweetest and
grandest work ! So many young people groiv, like
Topsy. They have no Christian care or culture
bestowed on them. All is yielded to their own will,
and that will is merely the whim of the hour, and the
natural result is seen in the waywardness, the folly,
the griefs, that characterize so many homes, and
which the Church so deeply deplores. Want of early
training is the ready explanation of much that is
seen in society to-day, and which does more to
defeat the energies of the Church than any other
known cause. But Mary brought Jesus up. Even
He had been to His mother the object of much
earnest, anxious, yearning, loving care. And the
most momentous of all this mother's concerns was
the training of that holy child who iiad been com-
mitted to her keeping. And to preserve her home
for the Lord is still the chief work of every mother,
from which no outside work can ever free her. Many
mothers think that this would circumscribe their
energies, and that God has called them to a more
public service. And while they profess to engage in
what they are pleased to call Christian work, they

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110 ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

207

leave their homes to become bear-gardens, and the
Lord is not honoured by this mistaken choice.

Jesus never forgot His mother's early care of Him,
and how much He was under obligation to her who
had nursed Him at her breast, and fondled Him on
her knee, in his helpless infancy. Mary was the
human instrument employed in impressing a know-
ledge of the Scriptures, and the fear of the Lord, on
the young mind and heart of her son ; for the truths
that filled her heart now, filled His in the after years
of His life. How tenderly and beautifully this plant
grew up, which the Father had planted in the garden
of Mary's home ! And what tender emotions filled
His soul when He came to say good-bye to Nazareth,
and leave the place dear to Him by a thousand
associations and tender memories of home life !

HIS OBEDIENCE TO IIIS PARENTS.

This was just what might have been expected to
follow as the natural result of such training as His.
How fondly Jesus cherished all the obligations that
His home imposed upon Him, and how He reverenced
that most fundamental of all relationships, and
honoured His father and mother as He would have
us do. At first His mother felt hurt at His remaining
behind them in Jerusalem — " So^", why hast thou
dealt with us thus, thy father and I have sought thee

208

HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

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sorrowinc-' ^ " But how readily He left behind all the
attractions of the great city, and went home with His
parents to that obscure little village. And then, it is
added, in one of those wonderfully suggestive
sentences, for which God's Word is remarkable —
" He remained subject to his parents." One stroke
completes a grand picture : a flood of light is let in
on His whole domestic and filial relations. He put
Himself lovingly under the control of His parents,
going and coming at their bidding, ever ready to run
an errand, or do a turn, or save the steps of His
mother, to anticipate her wish and brighten the home,
for love to her lay at the root of His life. He
engaged in His humble tasks and quiet duties with-
out a murmur, and thus He proved Himself a perfect
son, a loving brother, and a true friend.

How much brighter and better would many of our
homes become if His example were more closely
followed, and father and mother honoured, as they
deserve to be, by all their children. Many young lads
become too wise to take advice ; the)^ think they
know more than either father or mother, and grow
restive under parental control, and do everything
under protest. What a rebuke to all such conduct is
the example of Him who, during all the years He
was in His home, remained subject to His parents !

110 ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

209

HIS EARLY AND SILENT YEARS.

What a holy reserve hangs over the early years of
our Lord's life. Just where curiosity is most anxious
to put questions, it is met with solemn silence. There
is reticence on all subjects that minister to curiosity
without producing spiritual results — His appearance,
stature, complexion, colour of hair, eyes, or of what
temperament: — what His parents thought of Him;
what His brothers and sisters thought of Him when
He lived in the home with them : what impression
He made on those with whom He was associated ;
did He yield to the ordinary impulses of youth and
engage heartily in amusements ? The silence of
Scripture on these subjects is most expressive, and
we must walk with reverent feet through the secret
sanctuaries of our Lord's life. : ; ^

Our Lord's home-life has a peculiar and special
interest for us, and shows that our real life is not the
one Hved in publicity and before the gaze of the
world, but the unseen life lived in the secret places of
the Most High. It also shows that every true life
of service must be preceded by long years of quiet
preparation, with nothing but God and our own
conscience to urge us on. Our Lord's early years,
lived in the home of Nazareth, come nearer to us by
way of example, than the later and more public
periods when He was living His life of active service.

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IIOME-LIFR OF OUR LORD.

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His life under Mary's roof, in the quiet of those early
home-scenes, spent in the midst of His daily duties
and household cares, was more like the life we have
to live, through the dull routine of our every-day
engagements. And these test our character more
than public engagements do, for in these we have the
stimulus of the approbation, or disapprobation, of
thousands. The Jesus of Nacareth is more of a
pattern to us than the Jesus of Gethseniane, or the
Jesus of the Cross, or of His miraculous works. The
Gfrcat lesson of His life, as interpreted by Himself,
was, that we should be engaged in our Father's
business, in the field, or the shop, the office, or
market, even more than in the public walks of
Christian effort ; for this latter is the duty of the few,
but the former, of the thousands. God was with
Him, even at the carpenter's bench, and solitude, to
Him, was just another name for communion with
His Father. Our Lord's quiet hours, and His un-
noticed years, are worthy of study, in this age of
bustle, demonstrations, conventions, public oratory,
endless meetings, and general fussiness of the flesh.
At this particular time, there is great danger of
mistaking the ostentation of the old man for the zeal
of the i:ew one. The tendency to-day is to court
publicity and notoriety, and to crowd out the quiet
hours of reflection and devotion, so necessary to feed

HOME- LIFE OF OUR LORD,

211

50 early
^ duties
i^e have
ery-day
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the zeal

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the quiet
y to feed

and sustain the life that is hid with Christ in God.
Ever}' public life must rest on, and be fed by, this
inner, secret, unseen life as its proper root.

Jesus not only put Himself lovingly under parental
authority, and submitted to all the claims of an
ordinary household as son, brother, friend, and citizen,
but He lived in so quiet and natural a way, that His
most intimate friends — even His own brethren and
nearest relatives — saw no special marks of His
Messiahship. Nathanael, though living close by, had
never heard of Him, and was surprised at what was
now told him — " Can there any good thing come out
of Nazareth?" In this way, through the long, silent
years. He was being prepared for His work, built up
in body and mind for the three years of consuming
labour, that were so soon to follow.

HIS RELATION TO THE OTHER MEMBERS.

Much of the comfort and peace of a home
depends on the mutual esteem and sympathy, the
consideration and forbearance, of its inmates. If
misunderstanding and alienated affection enter, then
the very conditions of happiness are destroyed.
Beside Jesus, there were other members who were
either His own brothers and sisters, or who, at least,
stood to Him in this relation.

How few homes are happy, with no drawbacks

212

HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD,

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from selfishness, bad tempers, and want of considera-
tion ! As a handful of sand, thrown in among polished
machirery, jars, so there is more or less of friction in
most homes. And the home of Nazareth was no
exception, for Jesus had His own peculiar domestic
griefs, the chief of which was thj want of sympathy
on the part of the other members. His mother, who
had been proud of Him, now began to be greatly
disappointed at the course He was beginning to shape
' out for Himself His brethren thought they knew
better than He did, what line of conduct He ought
to pursue, and so they came to give Him advice.
During the years He had lived with them, His life
had been so natural and gentle, and, in many respects,
so like their own, tlicy could not bring themselves to
believe He was so much greater than they were, and
there may have been a measure of envy at His
growing popularity. They passed cold criticisms on
His actions, sought to compel Him to return home,
for thev had fears for His safety, and some doubts
dl-ou^ ]ils sanity. •

It is quite evident that Mary sympathized with the
others as against Him. And hardest of all to bear
were the reflections of His own mother, whom He
tenderly loved. Jesus would like to please her, and
please them all, but He must do His Father's will,
and finish His Father's work, and that came in other

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no ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

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forms, and in different splicres, than she cr they had
ima{4incd. So the proverb was fulfilled — "A skeleton
in every house" ; a worm at the root of every budding
joy, a shadow across the pathway of every sunny
prospect No tongue can tell what trouble it brought
to Mis heart that, " Neither did His brethren believe
in Him." The members of His own family left Him
to be ministered to by strangers, and the women who
waited upon Him were not His sisters, but kind
hearts found among strangers, who gave to Him of
their substance.

Want of sympathy at home must have been to
His sensitive nature one of His severest trials.
There is no unappreciated member of any of our
homes who can say, " I have trials to endure in this
respect which my Lord had no experience of, and did
not endure before me." For He who was in all
points tempted like as we are, bore those trials also —
the alienated affections of those who were closest on
earth to Him, even the reflections of His own
mother. Jesus quietly endured this wrong, and waited
till the shadows passed by, and a diviner peace united
all hearts in one. It was a temporary misunder-
standing, that did not lessen His affection for them.
He lived for them. He prayed for them ; and one of
His appearances after His resurrecticin was person-
ally and alone to James, His own brother, who when

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HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

convinced himself acquainted ail the others, and this
may be the explanation of the removal of all their
doubts. For mother and brethren, along with the
Apostles, swelled the enthusiasm that gathered around
His resurrection life, and shared the joys that filled
all their hearts. It is a sweet picture that closes the
scene. " These all continued with one accord in
prayer and supplication with the women, and Mary,
the mother of Jesus, and with His brethren." How
our Lord's example ought to encourage us to over-
look temporary misunderstandings, and to pray and
work for those who are our own flesh and blood,
and, in consequence, have a double claim upon our
Christian sympathies !

THE SCENES OF HIS YOUTH.

He was attached to Nazareth, and thought of it as
He did of no other place. He cherished it fondly,
as everyone does the place of his birth and boyhood.
Its gentle slopes, over which light and shadow chased
each other during the long summer day ; the valley,
carpeted with early blossoms ; the fringes of the
wooded vales ; the crystal brooks, making sweet
music as they went ; the wide prospect, from the vale
of the Jordan to the sparkling waters of the blue
Mediterranean ; the singing birds on many a bough ;
the quaint little houses and narrow streets, \vere all an

HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

21;

.nd this
ill their
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attraction to Him. And, because He was human, He
felt bound to the place where He had been brought
up by a thousand tender association j, and it cost His
heart a pang to leave it, and He felt all the more
keenly the rough treatment He received when He
returned to the early scenes of His life. I have
often striven to imagine the scene of our Lord's
return to Nazareth after His first preaching tour, and
His farewell to the place where He had lived for
thirty years.

When He stood up to read. His words were so
sweet. His aspect so tender and gracious, that all
admired Him, and felt honoured bv the fame of a
fellow-countryman. But they begin to ask : " Is not
this the carpenter's son ? Is not Mary His mother?
His brothers and sisters, are they not all here with
us ? Do we not know them all very well ? What right
then has He to assume any airs of superiority, or be
different from any of us ? When we are all common-
place, what right has He to be anything else?" And
so, as the flush of beauty fades from the evening
clouds, and leaves all cold and gray, so their admiration
changed to indifference, and that into alienation and
hatred, lul, at last, they rush upon Him to drag Him
forth to throw Him over the precipice. But He
passed through the midst of them and went His
way, and never returned to that humble roof that

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NO ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

had sheltered Him so long, and never preached more
in their little synagogue. But those early memories
continued to dwell in His heart, and He parted from

His friends now with regret.

HIS DEVOUT SPIRIT.

Here we do not refer specially to His long sessions
of prayer, so emphasized in the life He lived in the
flesh — " He went out and departed into a solitary
place and there prayed : He withdrew into the
wilderness and prayed : He continued .~1' j,at in
prayer, etc." These were not merely communings
with His Father, but were often the cry of an
anxious soul, an earnest calling upon God for help,
the expressed dependence of a weary heart that
longed for rest.

But we refer rather to His habits oi public worship,
and the honour He put upon the House of God.
How remarkable that statement — "As His custom
was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabba; i-
day," etc. From childhood His place in the syna-
gogue was never found vacant. In childhood He
worshipped as a child, and in manhood He worshipped
as a man. Who doubts that a little child can wor-
ship God ? Has God Himself not said that He has
perfected praise out of the mouth of babes ? While
living in Nazareth, a part of His bringing up was

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HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

217

the custom He had of worshipping each Sabbath
with His parents in the synagogue.

If ever there Hved a man who might deem public
worship unworthy of him, and quite unnecessary to
nourish his spiritual Hfe, Jesus was that man, and we
can suppose liat, with good reason. He might have
excused Himself from membership in a Church that
was by no means a pure communion, and never a
very inviting service. If any one could do it, we might
suppose Him to have preferred the green hills and
leafy bowers, the shady stream and flowery dells
around Nazareth : those bright spring mornings,
richly laden with the perfume of early blossoms,
under the wide dome of heaven — the great temple of
nature — to the close, stifling air of the little syna-
gogue. But Jesus never once did this. Nor did He
ever go out boating on the Sea of Galilee for
pleasure. But He regularly waited on the ordinances
of God's house, and as He listened to the Scriptures
read, and took part in the hymns and prayers of that
divine worship. He was brought into spiritual fellow-
ship with the great and the good of every age. It
was to His soul as the very gate of Heaven, and He
rejoiced in that union that made Him one with all
that had ever worshipped God in spirit and in truth.
He felt as David before Him had felt — " One day in
Thy courts is better than a thousand." Did that

218

no ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

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worshipper prove Himself to be a help or a hinderance
in the synagogue? Few sermons could be less in-
structive than those He heard from many a formal
preacher, and few sacred services could be less
inviting. Was this worshipper among the fault-
finders and obstructionists who stirred up trouble ?
Or was He among the earnest, the devout, the useful,
whose presence is always an inspiration ? If any-
thing was to be done, or help required, if any weary,
discouraged souls needed sympathy and care, they
were sure of findinc^ it in Him. I do not believe He
ever went forward at the close of the service to
grumble or complain, to worry the preacher, or leave
stinging words in the breast of anyone that was
doincj the best he knew how.

If our Lord's custom of attending public worship
were imitated by all His professed people, how many
vacant places would be filled up in our churches, and
how much more hearty many a dead service would
become ! How fruitful of excuses many are against
regular attendance on public worship ! The day is
very hot, or it is very cold ; it is very wet, or it is very
dry ; we have been unusually busy during the week,
and need the Sabbath to rest our exhausted frame ;
or we are not very well and must take a little
medicine (and it is wonderful how many are poorly

derance
less in-
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be less
2 fault-
rouble ?
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HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

210

on the Sabbath), and they will wait all the week in
order to take it on the Sabbath day.

Jesus never seems to liave had any of these excuses.
The house of God was a joy to Him, and we may
suppose that never, on any Sabbath, was His seat
vacant ; and the sweet, earnest, devout, loving
worshipper was always an inspiration, and He was
never found combining with a clique to have the rabbi
removed. Like the bee, that gathers honey from soot
when the flowers fail it, so He drew all the sweetness
and nutriment out of the service, and every day His
soul was refreshed by the public worship in God's
house.

THE SACRED RESERVE.

We have said there is a wonderful reticence on all
that does not minister to our spiritual profit, and idle
curiosity is always baffled. We would like to know
more of His home-life, but the scenes were too tender
to be spread out before curious eyes. On one or two
occasions the curtain is lifted, and we get a glimpse
of the manner of that life, and from that a fond
fancy loves to picture the whole. We arc told that
He grew in wisdom and stature: He remained subject
to His parents : He was in the habit of going to
worship in the synagogue on the Sabbath : He was a
carpenter, and was called the carpenter's son ; and,
from His supposed want of early education, those

220

HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

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who knew Him best wondered at His wisdom, show-
ing that they did not expect such manifestations from
Him. But, with these exceptions, and the one
inimitable anecdote told of Him when twelve years
of age, His infancy and early years remain unnoticed ;
a veil of concealment is drawn over them. Yet that life
of thirty years was actually lived, and it was all spent
in His father's business. His relation to His parents.
His brothers and sisters, His friends and early com-
panions, must have been full of interest. His words
and deeds in the home, even then, were worthy of
Him who was the Son of the Highest, as well as the
son of Mary. And seeing that home-life — the proper
conduct of young people toward their parents and
each other — forms such an important part of our
duty, we might suppose that more would have been
told us of that life spent in the home at Nazareth
under the roof of Joseph and Mary : how He filled
up His time ; to what extent and in what way He
engaged in manual labour; what were His recreations
and amusements ; His personal appearance ; the
relation He sustained to the villagers, and many
another subject beside.

But to have revealed these, would have made that
wondrous life too common. It was too sacred to be
trampled in the mire of a mere worldly interest ; the
curious eye may not scan it. It was the life of the

HO ME- LIFE OF OUR LORD.

221

holy child Jesus, lived in the presence of His Father.
This silence on the part of the Evangelists was not
owing to any lack of information, for John's house
had furnished a heme for Mary, and during those
later jears fond memory would often revert to those
early scenes in Nazareth, as they lay mirrored in the
wondrous life. And John must have had many con-
versations with her about it, and yet he, of all others,
says nothing about it. \ c wonder at the years of
silence, but He grew in silence as He grew in stature.
Noise is associated with building, but silence with
growth. So Jesus grew in that quiet home, as the
flowers grow that turn their faces to the sun. And if
we are to grow in spiritual stature, it must be by
drinking in quietly the light from the face of God, in
holy, silent, loving communion with Him. And
while imagination will continue to draw its ideal
pictures, and fill up the blank spaces, we must travel
with soft footsteps over scenes made sacred by such
a life, and not break in on the silent sanctities by idle
speculation or unprofitable curiosity.

But let us cull a few flowers that grow within this
inclosure. The innocent children noticed by Him as
they played in the green grass, braided with the early
blossoms of spring ; His fondling little children in
His arms and pressing them to His heart ; the picture
of a father unable to resist his child's plea ; His

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HOME-LIFE OF OUR LORD.

reading the feelings of a mother's yearning heart, or
a father's anguish ; with many a fond picture besides
of home and childhood, are all personal recollections,
and show that His mind often went back to the
happy, early memories of Nazareth. His life all
through must have been very attractive, for though,
at times, His presence was impressive and awe-
inspiring, yet He inspired strong personal friendship,
and to all who came seeking Him He was so easy of
approach that men drew to Him as children run to
their mother, while the very outcasts felt as if summer
had come to their souls, when He looked upon them.
And though it is recorded of Him only twice, yet
must it have often happened, that, on many a summer
evening, as the soft light faded away, little children
sat on His knees, and looked up into that sweet face
with fondness, and saw in it all the love of Heaven,
till they fell asleep on His bosom.

How dear it makes home to think that Jesus was
brought up by a mother amid the common cares and
labours of a household. For that home in which
Jesus was brought up, had, like all others, its own
anxieties and sorrows. But sweet must have been
that atmosphere of holy trust that sanctified all these.
In such a soil did this tree of righteousness grow, for
He lived among other children and young people,
and performed all the duties of son and brother.

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223

Hence the unconscious babe in the cradle, or in its
mother's arms, has a Saviour that once lay there in
sweet, helpless innocence. The little prattling feet
arc passing along where the child Jesus has gone
before it. And the love of brothers and sisters for
each other is ennobled b}' the love which Jesus bore
to those who stood in this relation to Him. He
carried the joyousness of His early years into His
opening ministry, which was bright and cheerful, for
He began it amid scenes of social and domestic
happiness, and His mother's house was His first
temple. Our homes are all the more sacred and
peaceful because of His. And in all this world there
is none so patient, so lenient and considerate, as He
who became my brother in the flesh. And there is
nothing my dearest friend can do for me that goes
into all the wants and cares of the soul like His
blessed ministry — a ministry laden with the love of
God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

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THE PRACTICAL USES OF THE BAPTISM

OF INFANTS.

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Every man-child among you shall be circumcised .... and it shall
be a token of the covenant between me and thee. — (len. xvii., lo, II.

And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac, being eight days old, as
God had commanded him. — Gen. xxi., 4.

And when she was baptized and her household. — Acts xvi., 15.

And was baptized, he and all his, straight v -Acts xvi., 33.

I baptized also the househok' of Stepliano. . Cor. i., 16.

Greet the church that is in their house. — Rom. xvi., 5.

Else were your children unclean, but now are they holy. — i Cor.vii.,14.

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USES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

It is sometimes asked, What purpose is served by
the baptism of infants? What good does it do them?
It is the old objection-What profit is there in circum-
cision ? And we answer now as it was answered tlien :
Much, everyway. Mf infant baptism were more
improved it won' : be less disputed," said Philip
Henry. The question is easily asked, What good
does it do a child to bapti/e it f but it was just as easy
and as common to ask, What good did it do a child
to circumcise it ? Yet it was commanded by God to
be circumcised. And though we are more concerned
in finding out the Divine will, yet we hope to be able
also to point out some of the practical uses of the
baptism of infants, and to show that the rite is
salutary as well as Scriptural.

The parties to this solemn transaction are four, viz.,
\hQ parmts, the child, the Church, and the Saviour.

THE PARENTS.
They are the first and most deeply interested party.
To them, especially, infant baptism has tender associa-

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[/SES OF liVFANT BAPTISM.

tions, peculiarly precious. Parents feel deeply solici-
tous for the eternal welfare of their offspring ; their
prayer is the prayer of Hagar — " O that Ishmael
may live before Thee," and they long to bring their
children within the bonds of the covenant. And the
ordinance meets the deep yearning of every Christian
parent's heart, enabling them to feel that their children
are, with themselves,, members of the visible Church,
capable of grace and salvation, and, so far as children
can be, made partakers of the privileges and blessings
of the Gospel.

The righc to present their child to the Lord in
baptism depends on their own moral qualification.
The parents' faith makes their child holy — i Cor.
vii., 14. The very ?ct of baptism, therefore, suggests
most solemn personal enquiry on the part of the
parents — Am I a child of God ? My child's standing
depends on my own ! Have 1 the faith that gives us
both a standing in His kingdom? Or has my unbelief
cut my child off? The very nature of the service
implies self-examination and self-consecration. And
it is in the spirit of hope, and earnest trust in the God
of the Covenant, that the offering is made, with the
earnest prayer that the Good Shepherd will accept
this dear lamb and keep it forever within the fold.
This covenant, at first, was a family covenant, in
which God engaged to be the God of the seed^ as of

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229

the father, and the seal of the covenant was applied
to the child. A fathet, by his own .and, may legally
sign a bond which binds, not himself alone, but his
children also ; he may take an oath, and all his family
are bound by it. And with the same propriety, but
with far deeper significance, can he enter into the
obligations of Christian baptism, and say, with Joshua,
*' Others may do as sccmcth them good, but as for me
and my house we will serve the Lord."

God rested the fulfilment of His covenant on the
conduct of Abraham, as He rests it on our conduct
now. " For I know Jiivi that he will command his
children and his household after him, and thev shall
keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment,
that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which
He hath spoken of him." — Gen. xviii., 19. These
truths must tend to deepen our sense of responsibility,
and cause us to renew our vows of fidelity again and
again, while we are constrained to ask. Are these
pledges redeemed? And are we ourselves all that we
desire our children to become?

The Saviour says to every parent in baptism, what
Pharaoh's daughter said to the mother of Moses,
"Take this child away, and nurse it for mc." — Ex. ii., 9.
A child is influenced by what it sees, hears, and learns
in the home each day ; the atmosphere in which it lives
will determine the character of the child. Is the tone

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USES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

of the home worldly, frivolous, vain ? Is it mean,

gossiping, envious, or avaricious ? Or is it earnest,

healthful, pure, and Christian ? This will determine,

more than anything else, the future of your child, and

no technical training can take the place of that warm,

subtle, pervasive influence with which a parents' faith

and love fill his home What a solemn charge it is !

the care of an immortal soul ! A child born into the

world, whose future welfare is largely determined by

its parents! Dear fathers and mothers, your children

have been given you to be taught and trained for the

Master, that they may be a seed to serve Him. The

parent who makes his home Christless is false to the

holiest obligations and the divinest duties of life. He

who refuses to enter in through the gate of his family

privileges, is robbing his children of their birthright.

And what a burden to any home are godless children !

Whenever such are sent forth upon the world, let

parents ponder how far they are responsible!

If notMng else were secured by the baptism of
infants than the making prominent of these truths,
there would be enough to justify the practice, and
show the wisdom of God in institutincf it,

THE CHURCH, AND BAPTISM OF INFANTS.

The Church is another party represented in the
ordinance of baptism, and holds relations to the child,

USES OF IX FA NT BAPT/SM.

231

whom she recognizes and receives as a member ; to
the parents, whom she seeks to encourage and aid,
and to the God of the Covenant, whose promises she
pleads.

From the fact that parents alone are usually
addressed when their infants are baptized, and seldom,
if ever, a single word is said to the congregation, the
impression has become general that they alone are
concerned in the ordinance. But when we consider
the duties of the Church to the lambs of the flock,
and with what solemnity she has been charged to
feed those lambs, the Church's interests and welfare
are as directly involved as those of the parents.
Through baptism the Church adopts that child, and
recognizes it as a member of the household of faith, and
for the welfare of that child she pledges her prayers,
example, experience, and influence. And when that
child grows up to the years of understanding, the
Church is bound to add her counsels, her sympathy
and holy binding, along with those of the parents,
that together they may take oversight of the flock,
and the lambs may never be separated from the fold.

The baptized are not aliens, but subjects of the
kingdom, in whom the Church must have the deepest
concern, and upon whom she is bound to exert her
best influences. She furnishes the tneans of gracCy
and co-operates with parents in the godly up-bringing

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USES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

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of the young. It is her duty to throw around her
children every safeguard against sin, and to furnish
them with all the motives of the Gospel for righteous
conduct. The influence of the Sanctuary and of the
Christian home must unite, and be a double guarantee
that the religious training of the young will not be
neglected ; and, surely, to every earnest-minded
parent, such co-operation must be most encouraging.
When the fire burns low on the hearth, the thought
that the whole company of God's people have common
interests and anxieties with ourselves, and by prayer
and sympathy are co-operating with us for the same
results, gives us the full benefit of Christian brother-
hood, and shows us that what we do, we do in common
v/ith all saints, so that no parent must feel as if he
stood alone and unsupported in his greatest work.
I fear that many of our congregations have much to
learn before they feel that baptism is no mere private,
family transaction, but that the Church, no less than
the parent, must take hold of the covenant and plead
its promise.

It is only in the Christian Church, and in a land
of Christian institutions, that the homes are the
nurseries for God, and the children grow up a seed to
serve Him. Pagan lands do not bear the fruits of
faith ; the sin and unbelief of the father come as a
blight upon the children, and the wickedness of one

USES OF IN FA XT BAPTISM.

233

generation is often transmitted to another, while God-
fearing parents hand down their Sabbaths, their
sanctuaries, and holy memories, and God blesses the
children for the parents' sakes. Why are we confident
that the heathen nations of to-day will still be heathen
nations a hundred years hence, if the Gospel be not
carried to them ? Just because we know that unbelief
is handed down from generation to generation, and
the paganism of the father becomes the paganism of
the child. And for the same reason we know that
the Christian lands of to-day will be the Christian
lands of the future, if they prove faithful to their
trust; for the privileges of the Church descend in the
line of the faithful. Such is the closeness of the
connection between generation and generation,
whether of faith, or of unbelief Such is the heritage
— so rich and bountiful — that comes from being
connected with the visible Church of Christ, for from
that God gathers His sons and daughters. I^aptized
children are, like Samuel, given to the Lord, borne
on our heart before Him, held b\' our faith and
encompassed by our prayers, and, therefore, in the
channel of His blessing. By the direction of the
Good Shepherd they are to be counted the lambs of
His flock, to be treated as such, to be fed, trained, and
tended as His. The sheep are not to be in the fold
and the lambs left outside, but the lambs are to be

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USES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

with the sheep as a part of the same flock. What
blessed influences are in this way brought to bear on
the minds and liearts of the young! It was after
Abraham had given up his family to God that it was
said of him, " I know that he will command his
children and his household after him."

In every baptism service we are not looking on a
purely private family transaction, for it is an ordinance
of sacred associations to us all, and in which the
Church at large, as well as the parents, has a direct
interest. By this ordinance these little ones are
recognized as members of the visible Church, which
promises to take a wise, loving, and faithful oversight,
to care for them as the lambs of the flock, and bring
them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

I fear the Church dc^s not clearly realise the true
import of the baptism of her children, nor is she as
faithful to the young under her charge as she should
be, while it is to be feared that through her neglect
many of the young are allowed to wander from the
right ways of the Lord. Few have learned to
appreciate the great power of this lever to lift up the
rising race, or know what a hand of discipline it
furnishes, by which she may hold her young together.
When young people make shipwreck, all blame is laid
at the door of the parents, and the Church seldom
thinks of her own responsibility. And yet by her

USES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

235

criminal neglect, her Pharisaic or sectarian spirit, her
worldly policy, and the chilly atmosphere that almost
freezes, the Church may be as much to blame as the
parents.

Is the atmosphere which the Church breathes
around the home warm and pure ? Or is there a chill,
as from a north wind, coming in through the doors
and windows? Is the Church dead, fanatical, sectarian,
and rent by divisions? Or does she carry a benediction
with her, as fresh from the presence of Christ ? When
she receives the child through baptism, is it into the
earnest, loving, faithful school of Christ, where all
manner of blessed help and influence will be enjoyed ?
Or will the Church, through neglect, only prove the
minister of evil, and the grace of God fail because of
her want of faith and labours of love ? Much more
must be done than is now common, to gather in and
feed the lambs.

■m

THE CHILDREN THEMSELVES.

The ordinance is theirs, for " The children of such
as are members of the visible Church are to be
baptized." Children of believers are themselves
members of the Church, and are to receive baptism
as the pledge of such membership, and a seal of the
duties and privileges pertaining to it. Such are
recognized as scholars to be taught in the school of

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USES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

W !

Christ. As the lambs of the flock, they are bound by
their position to a life of obedience. They cannot
grow up in a life of sin, without proving false to their
standing as the children of the covenant. At their
baptism the parent makes the fullest, strongest expres-
sion of Christian hope, and feels the warm glow of
personal solicitude that they may grow up as the
heirs of this inheritance. Though we must admit the
sad fact that many who grow up in the Church not
only stand aloof, but trample the law of Christ under
foot ; yet why is it that our ranks are so often broken,
and thousands lost to the Church ? One very obvious
reason is that children have not been taught their
place and privileges, and their standing, as baptized
children, has not been taken advantage of, and they
have not been made to feel the holy binding under
which they lie, to live as the children of God. Instead
of growing up children of the devil — for some future
day of grace, if it ever come, let them be shown the
glorious possibility of being Christ's from their infancy,
that they may learn early to walk in all lowly obedi-
ence. We dare not doubt either i\-\Q possibility, or the
fact, that the Holy Spirit can make the young subjects
of His gracious power, and seal their hearts from the
beginning of their days. This is the blessed signifi-
cance and intent of the baptism of infants.

But we must not expect too much from our

USES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

2-^7

om our

children — a life and experience beyond their years, a
sobriety and seriousness, that would be unnatural and
unreal. There is also a kind of teaching that requires
in each and every case a conscious conversion within
certain definite times. And in the popular mind this
is, to a great extent, the test of grace. But the
proper evidence of the work of the Spirit are the
fruits of the Spirit, and, when these are growing in
the heart, we need not seek other or better proofs.

We need less technicality, and more naturalness,,
and Christian parents must learn to speak in all
simplicity to their children about the Saviour ; that
He loves them, takes care of them, wants them to
love Him, and that prayer is just speaking to Him
as one man speaks to another. That He who once
fondled littk children on His kn-^e, or pressed them
to His bosom, has the same wonderful, warm, earnest
love for them still, and that His heart is open to
receive them all. And tell this to your children in
the same tone of voice, and in the same direct natural
manner that you talk to them about other things,.
Make their way to the Saviour easy, and fewer would
go astray, and become forever alienated.

THE TRESENCE OF THE .SAVIOUR IN THE ORDIxNANCE.

Unless we can claim Him as present and sustaining
intimate relations to parents, the child, and the Church,

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USES OF INFANT 13 APT ISM.

our faith and hope would have nothing to rest upon,
and the service would be unmeanincj. But as the
Church's Head, He has promised to fulfil His part of
the covenant, and demands of us that we fulfil ours.

To parents He says, " The promise is to you and
to your children " ; "I will be a God to you and to
your seed after you." This is just as much as to say,
" What I have been to you I will also be to them.
As I have chosen you, blessed you, kept you, and
loved you, I will do all this to your children." In
short, it means that He will he a God to them as He
has been a God i.. us. And by all our own experi-
ences of the Divine goodness we may know what is
in store for our children, and what a rich future is
opening up for them, if they rely on His promises.
This is the legitimate resting-place of every believing
parent, and if, in the providence of God, they are caken
away before their children grow up, it is given them
to know that they are in the direct line of descent
from the Father of the Faithful, whose children are as
the sand upon the sea-shore for multitude.

But to the children themselves the Lord is no less
near. They are to be called Jioly to the Lord, not
because of their personal character, but because of
the peculiar relation in which they, as the children
of the covenant, stand to Him. Through baptism
these children are dedicated to the Lord, to be trained

C/S£S OF fiVFANT BAPTISM.

2:10

up from their infancy as His. By His own act of
ncorporation they arc consecrated and given a place
in His vineyard, planted in the garden of grace, to
grow up as trees of righteousness. He is not the
God of individuals only, but of the families of Israel.
To the Church, also, as His purchased possession,
He has guaranteed His presence and guidance, that
she may be encouraged to be faithful to her great
trust. We are commanded to feed the flock of
Christ which He hath purchased with His own blood,
and the lambs must be fed as a part of that flock ;
while baptism is the token oi our Saviour's presence
and the pledge of the fulfilment of His promise, and
through its observance the Church is permitted to
cherish, and to follow out to their fullest scope, the
yearnings of her heart for the welfare of those
committed to her care by the Shepherd. This
morning, the Church has met for public worship,
made up of the families of Israel. This afternoon,
the Church will again meet for the teaching of the
young — the lambs of the flock being assembled for
this purpose. On Thursday evening, the Church will
again meet for social prayer and praise. In a few
minutes, the Church will observe the ordinance ot
baptism, and publicly recognize as belonging to the
Shepherd two little lambs of the flock. We are
doing to-day what the Church has all along been

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commanded to do, i.e.^ receiving little children as
Subjects of the Kingdom, and trainin^j them in loyalty
of heart for the King. But how is the Church
herself affected by all this? Is she encouraged and
comforted by the Saviour's promised presence?
And does the command, " Feed My lambs," find a
ready response? VVe desire to wake up the Church
to the full import of infant baptism, and, though it is
true that many who have been baptized are no better
than aliens, this does not detract from its spiritual
value. The abuse of an ordinance is no argument
against its use. Esau sold his birthright, for he was
a profane man. Though a member of the chosen
family, he found fellowship more congenial to his
tastes outside. So is it with many to-day who belong
to pious homes, for whom many a God-fearing
mother's heart yearns ; they find congenial companion-
ship among the apostates from the faith. Many even
turn their bac;< upon the Saviour, but this does not
prove His blood valueless, for He is still precious to
those who believe. So the present standing of the
seed of the righteous cannot be departed from with-
out incurring great guilt.

When we take Scriptural views of baptism, and
know the care that must be taken of the young, all
unworthy ideas of the ordinance are removed, and
we see that the place given to infants in the Church,

USES OF LVFA.Vr liAniSM.

241

and the training whicli tliis implies, are worthy of the
wisdom and love of God. What a <;racious influence
it ought to liavc on the minds of the young, the
constant feeling that tiieir parents have dedicated
them to tlie Lord through the ordinance of baptism,
and enrolled them as disciples ; that they are to be
constantly watched over by the Church, and that, as
the lambs of His flock, they are dear to the Shepiierd.
VV^e can make the fact of their dedication the plea
with them before God not to neglect His covenant
promises. We are permitted to plead, till Christ be
formed within the hearts of our children, the hope of
glory. We expect that as households worship here
together on the earth, so households shall meet around
the throne on high, and rejoice together, ascribing
praise to Him who is not slack concerning His
promises.

And what a gracious influence all this must have
on the minds of Christian parents, and how it must
tend to deepen their sense of responsibility as lying
under the vows of the Lord concerning their child,
and knowing that their chief concern is the moulding
of his character ! An unbelieving father blights the
prospects of his child, and may be the cause of his
moral ruin. The infidel, the profane, the Sabbath-
breaker transmit their influence, and affect the well-
being of those that come after them. While, on the

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other hand, faith, piety, love, prayer, form a channel
through which blessings flow upon the generations
that follow, and our children become heirs f our
privileges, and enter into the heritage of our faith.

A WORD TO CHILDKKN.

Children, don't comi)lain that you have been bound
without your consent : we bind you in secular things
witiiout your consent. Both God and the laws of
your country, as well as the requirements of Society,
bind the young without asking their leave. The
child is always bound by the father's act.

Children, grace has descended from generation to
generation in an unbroken line of pious ancestry
down to vou, and now is that line to be broken bv
you? Are you to be the first who, through unbelief,
will cast away from you the heritage of the Lord ?
Oh ! shrink from breakmg those covenant enfracre-
ments ; court not the condemnation of sin, nor try
to break those cords with which Christ seeks to draw
you to Himself and bind you forever to His own
heart. Let this seal of the covenant ever remind you
of your high calling, your privileges and duty as
children of the covenant. Yield to the prayers and
solicitations of your best friends, and grow up as the
children of p'/omise. Don't sell your birthright, for
it has been given you as an everlasting possession.

C/SES OF INFANT BAPTISM.

243

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To turn your back on your covenant, God may leave
no place for repentance, though you were to seek it
carefully with tears. Oh, ^..y the Holy Spirit seal
'ind keep you unto the day of redemption ; may
Jesus throw His everlasting arms around you and
keep you for Himself; may the Father receive you
as His own children into the home. Having received
the baptism of zmter,m^y you all receive the baptism
of the Holy Spirit-the washing of regeneration
that will make you whiter than snow.

Note. -For some ideas in this chapter, the author is indebted to
«.. article in the Princeton Review, read twenty-five years ago.

ssession.

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GROWTH IN THE DIVINE LIFE.

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Let us go on to perfection. — Heb. vi., i.

But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour
Christ Jesus. — 2 Pet. iii., 18.

Forgetting those things that are behind and reaching forth to those
things that are before. — Philip, iii., 13.

Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect,
but I follow on. — Philip, iii., 12.

Fui the perfecting of the saints .... till we all come in the unity
of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect
man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.— Eph.
iv., 12, 13.

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GROWTH L\ THE DIVINE LIFE.

To grow in grace is different from merely growing
old. It is very easy to grow old ; we have merely to
-sit still and do nothing, and the mere lapse of time
accomplishes all the rest. But to grow old wisely,
and in daily maturing discipleship, is the great and
difficult task to which we must give ourselves. Some
people grow old, struggling and fighting against tlie
Tact all the time, clinging to each birthday as a
drowning man catches at an overhanging bougl>.
They would fain linger by life's full, flowing stream,
and bask in the sunshine of its bountiful promise ;
but no man can fight against nature or the tendencies
of things ; we must float down with the current, and
should, therefore, strive that, by the grace of God,
the passing years may witness our growth into a
better, a nobler, and a happier self, each day learning
to take a truer aim and worthier pride in all that is
of good report, and cultivating those fruits of the
Spirit which enrich and adorn our life, always tending
to that glorious consummation when we shall attain
to the moral perfection of Christ Himself, and be
filled with all the fulness of God.

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248

GROWTH IX THE DIVINE LIFE.

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GOING ON TO PERFECTION IS INCULCATED AS A
LAW ON THE CONSCIENCE.

Growth in ^race is commanded as a duty, conferred
as a grace, and is expected as the fruits of our faith.
We must forget the things that are behind, and reach
forth unto that which is before, and when we cease
to press forward toward the mark, we lose the only
evidence of being God's children. With that zeal,
which was always a ruling passion in His own breast,
the Apostle urges upon all disciples to leave the first
principles of the doctrine of Christ, and go on to
perfection. Don't spend all your time in laying the
foundation of repentance and faith, but build thereon
a blessed structure of perpetual duration. "Add to
your faith, virtue ; and to virtue, knowledge ; and to
knowledge, temperance ; and to temperance, patience ;
and to patience, godliness ; and to godliness, brotherly
kindness ; and to brotherly kindness, charity." Every
child of God must grow, expand, and ripen, till he
comes to the full stature of a man in Christ Jesus.
Not crawling as a worm in the dust among mean and
base things, but we must rather aim to be as the
•eagle that soars upward, and that has the whole sweep
of the heavens for his proud flight, till he seems to
reach the very neighbourhood of the sun. We, too,
must mount up with wings as eagles, and soar into
the heavenly places.

GROWTH IN THE DIVINE LIFE.

249

PROGRESSIVE HOLINESS IS THE ORDINARY

SCRIPTURAL REPRESENTATION OE THE

DIVINE LIEE IN THE SOUL.

Paul was not exhibiting liis own ideal, or describing
his own case, but portraying the normal type of
spiritual growth universally. It was needful for all to
forget the things that are behind, and reach forth unto
those that are before. All who profess to be His,
must press forward toward the mark for the prize :
reaching forth now and forever, and pulling the riper
fruit that grows on the higher boughs in the garden of
God. We must gain on the future by an oblivious-
ness of the past, and, in a sense, far higher than the
poet meant,

" Men may rise on stepping stones
Of their dead selves to higher things."

The believer's life is represented as a race — long
and hazardous — which he must run, and many a
weight he must lay aside, and many a difficulty
encounter, and many an experience he must gain.
Moreover, he can take but one step at a time, and, as
he runs, he must ever look to Jesus and learn lessons
for the way. In his early experiences and imperfect
knowledge, a young convert is spoken of as a babe
in Christ, with all the weaknesses and waywardness
of a child ; with the limited knowledge and self-will
of a child, and simply because of these very limita-

250

GROIVTII IN THE DIVINE LIFE.

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tions, thinking he is wiser, and stronger, and better
than any one else. But the babe in Christ must
grow up from this crude and imperfect beginning,
from this immature condition, to the full stature of a
man in Christ, his nature being daily enriched, and
rounded out into the symmetry and beauty of a
mature disciple. Spiritual dwarfs are as little to be
desired as natural ones, and the only reason we do
not convert them into shows and objects of wonder
is because they are so common.

No one begins as a strong man to run a race, but
only as a child learning to walk with faltering step,
and is kept from falling by the grace of God, till his
goings are established in righteousness. No man
begins to serve Christ at the point of perfection, or
even of matured experience. This is where he leaves
off, when he lays aside his tabernacle of clay. Grace
in the heart is a small piece of leaven, and it often
lies long concealed, but it gradually leavens the whole
lump, till the whole man — body, soul, and spirit —
yields a joyful obedience to that Saviour whom he
has been learning more and more to love and serve.
Our enlightenment in the knowledge of Christ is not
an instantaneous act, as a flash of lightning dispels
all the darkness in a moment. The long, dreary
night of sin is dispelled as the natural night is. Day
breaks upon the soul as it breaks upon the world, the

GKOIVTH IN THE D I VISE LIFE.

251

morning gradually expanding into noon. God shines
into our heart as He shines over the fair face of
creation. Enlightenment comes as the morning star
that arises, and then the first faint streaks of light
deepen into that better day, from whose presence all
the shadows flee away.

THIS INCREASE IN THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD IS
GRADUAL AND PROGRESSIVE.
Planted together with Christ, we gradually grow-
together with Him. Our quickening through the
Spirit is the beginning, of which our complete freedom
from sin is the end. But between these there inter-
vene the workings of God's renewing grace, and
the various steps of progressive holiness. In the
spiritual husbandry, as in the natural, there is first
the blade, then the ear, and, last of all, the full corn
in the ear ; the spring-time of sowing ; the bud, the
blossoms, and various growths of summer ; and then
the harvest of ripened fruits. A germ is planted in
the heart, which is to grow into the tree of righteous-
ness. That proud monarch of the forest, standing,
through rain and sunshine, against the full sweep of
many a tempest, has sprung from the acorn, and has
grown by the double process of shedding off and
putting on, of dying and living at the same time.
So the plants of our Heavenly Father grow into

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252

GROlVrn IX THE DIVIDE LIFE.

trees of rifrhtcousncss, accordinc; to the same law of
dyin^j unto sin and living unto righteousness ; of
putting off the old man and putting on the new ;
unclothed, and being clothed upon ; each day putting
on some new feature of Christ's perfect character.
We must begin at the alphabet, pass through the
rudiments, and on to the higher experiences of
Christian knowledge. As in any other journey, it is
only step by step we advance, going on from strength
to strength. This advance may be small, }'ct it is real
and permanent.

Sometimes we are growing when everything seems
stationary, ai, . really advancing when to all outward
appearance we arc going back. The Holy Spirit's
secret work on the heart may not always be evident,
and yet may prove the groundwork of a noble edifice.
When we .see a tree standing dead and cheerless in
the January storm, or in bleak autumn days, when its
leaves have all faded and been torn off by the blast —
standing as a skeleton through the long, cold night,
who would imagine there was any life left in that
tree ? Yet this is a neces.sary part of this tree's
development : it is laying in the sap and richness
that will enable it to all the more burst forth
abundantly into leaf and blossom next summer.
When the soil lies hard and frozen, it is being
prepared for bearing the waving harvests next year.

GROWTH IN THE DIVINE LIFE.

253

There are living seeds beneath that cold, hard surface,
that will germinate into bountiful life, when the
time of the singing of birds has come.

So there are times when our nature seems dormant ;
the soil of the heart is lying fallow and barren, and
as if sheeted in frosty indifference. Yet all is only
waiting God's good time ! The deadness we deplore
may be a preparation for a more plenteous harvest,
a brighter blooming forth, a more fruitful growing
when times of refreshing come from the presence of
the Lord.

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THIS IMMATURE BEGINNINCi BUT CONSTANT

GROWTH IN RIGHTEOUSNESS IS THE UNIVERSAL

EXPERIENCE OF ALL GOD'S CHILDREN.

From scarcely attempting to spell out the name of
Jesus, they at length come to know it as above every
name, and sweet as honey to the mouth. At first
hesitating to confess Him, He gradually becomes to
His chosen ones all their desire, and all their salvation.
Once feeling as if only " almost persuaded" to a full
and joyous acceptance as the chosen of their heart's
desire, they began to walk as little children, but
their steps became stronger as they advanced along
that way. All Christian biography is an illustration
of this. ..^, ^ - —

Examine the lives of the saints, and it will be seen

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254

GROWTH AV THE DIVIDE fJFE.

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tliat they all drew nearer and yet nearer to the perfect
pattern, and that the trees p anted by the rivers of
water became more firmly rooted the longer they
grew. Who supposes that Abraham's strong faith in
the God of the Covenant was learned in one dav ?
To make such a sacrifice at the simple bidding of
God was an attainment reached after a long walk
with Him. We find Moses learning, through many
a severe lesson, to curb his temper, till he became
remarkable for his meekness, making the weak point
of his character to become the strongest. It took
Joseph a good many years of self-discipline to get
over his vanity and boyish fancies, and the timid
Nicodemus to grow into that holy courage that
enabled him, in the face of danger, to take the
mutilated body of his Master down from the tree —
glad to bear all the odium of being regarded as one
of His disciples. We admire the fruit, but overlook
the long ripening process ; we see results, but forget
the ten thousand influences that went to produce
them. So, in the case of each plant that grows in
the garden of God, there must be first the bud, the
twig, the sapling, before there can be any cedar of
Lebanon with its wide refreshing shade.

In all those beautiful and graceful qualities of
mind and heart, which most attract the love and
admiration of those around us, and in all those graces

GJ^OWTH IX THE DIVIXE LIFE.

255

that fit for tlic purer and happier fellowship of
Heaven, advancinir years must still be years of growth
and enlarnrement through the Spirit. In the last
days it maybe rather a ripenii)g tiian a mere growth ;
a mellowing rather than an expanding— coming on
to perfection like the clustering fruits of autumn— a
yellow sheaf to be gathered in. The yellow harvest-
fields of waving grain arc a great advance )n the
fresh, green blades of June, though both are natural
in their season. So the later cxi)erienccs of a
believer are the ripened fruits of which the earlier
are only the germs and tender bua^, ; ^nd through all
the incidents of the summer of life he goes on to
perfection, growing in grace and in the knowledge of
Christ Jesus.

WE MUST MAKE EVERY CIRCUMSTANCE IN LIFE
CONTRIBUTE TO THIS INCREASE IN THE
KNOWLEDGE OF GOD.
Some things we can carry on only at certain times
and places, as the opportunities offer. The student
must be in his study and with his books ; the scholar
learns best when under the eye of an efficient teacher ;
the farmer must be out in his fields, where the
ploughing and sowing are done ; the professional
man finds it necessary to be in his office or place of
business, and the physician by the side of his patient.

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256

GROWTH LV THE DIVINE LIFE.

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But in the building up of Christian character in
knowledge and righteousness, enriching the heart
with all the graces of the Spirit, and learning to
walk before the Lord unto all pleasing, every place
and circumstance and event should furnish the fitting
occasion, and contribute to our increase in the know-
ledge of God, and help us on the way to perfection.

As a magnet attracts the filings of steel from out
a heap of rubbish, so when the heart h?s been
magnetized by the love of Christ, what seems to be
only refuse and rubbish, thrown into the grea*^ waste-
basket of daily toil and endurance, may contribute
most directly to the strengthening of our faith ;
while difficulties truly met may prove the very
enriching of the heart. When the purpose of our
life is focused on the upbuilding of character in
Christian experience, golden shekels may be gathered
up from all the miscellaneous changes in our lot.
As the bee, flying over ten thousand flowers, brings
back but one essence, and gathers up her stores of
honey, and can gather them from soot when flowers
fail her, so, whether travelling by the way, or living in
the quiet of our homes; whether meeting with success
or levcrses; whether lying under a cloud of obloquy,
or when t'^e world is fawning upon us ; whether in
joy or in sorrow. Christian men and women must
gather their wealth from all sides and sources.

GROWTH IN THE DIVLWE LIFE.

257

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Is the past to be only a barren waste, crumbling
away behind us when we have travelled over it ?
Should not its holy memories and gathered experi-
ences be rather a force at the back of the present,
pushing us onward and upward ? All the lessons
from the past converging on the focus of daily duty
and consecrating for us all the activities of life. And
surely in mellov .'.d experience, in calm and sober
views of life and duty, in tempered expectations, in
patience and sympathy, in sobriety of judgment, in
charity toward all men, in all the good offices of
Christian manhood, we should expect growth, and
that all our foolish fancies shall be winnowed from us
by the salutary discipline of life. In all that consti-
tutes mature discipleship, age should be better than
childhood, and the last days riper than the iirst, as the
mature fruit is better than the bud or blossom, or the
green pips of spring and early summer. As pilgrims,
let all our way appear steps unto Heaven, and,

" Nij;hlly pitch our moving tent
A day's march nearer home,"

And if our life is cast in the proper mould, it will
constantly shai)C itself nearer and nearer to the
perfect pattern.

TO THIS GROWTH NO LIMIT IS SET.
As to duration, it is for eternity, and as to expansion,
it is up to the perfection of God, and the fulne.ss that

"if

258

GROWTH IN THE DIVINE LIEE.

is in Him. The top of the ladder on which we are
climbing up touches Heaven, and we have around us
the whole amplitude of God's grace as the ocean of
His sunlight in waves of luminousness. Our best
and richest gains here are but earnests and foretastes
of the fulness of the great hereafter, when we shall be
like Him and see Him as He is. Noiv, we see
through a glass darkly, but tJicii, face to face : noiv,
we kno"- only in part, but tJiciL we .'-hall know even
as we are known. What a great difference bctwem
now and tJien. Through the multitudinous details of
duty, we are following on to know the Lord, and
His going forth before 'i.' will be as the morning,
with increasing radiance, till all the shadows have
fled away. A saving knowledge of tiie truth now is
the earnest of cTi eternal weight of glory, and a
pledge of e.idless fellowship with Lhose whose robes
have been washed and made white in the blood of
the Lamb.

The whole future is open, with nothing to obstruct,
so that grace in the heart is Heaven begun, while all
that comes after is tl:_ certain progress on our way
to perfection ! In setting out on this race, the believer
is beginning a journey that brings him to the
mountain of the Lord's house, and to His right hand
where there arc pleasures for evermore. Although
we are sons of God noiv^ it doth not yet appear what

GROWTH IN Tf'E DIVL\h LIFE.

259

we shall be. It is nothing short of the fulness of
God u'e have to draw from. We have to attain to
the full stature of men in Christ. Grace and peace
are to be multiplied upon us, and every <^ain we make
now increases our riches; every deposit here increases
the interest of a bountiful return, not even a cup of
cold water given will lose its reward.

The same grace saved the thief on the cross that
saved the Apostle of the Gentiles ; but Paul will
start at a point far in advance of the former. Had
the Apostle died on the day of his conversion, he
still would have won the crown, but, then, the future
would have been shorn of much of its brightness, and
his inheritance would have been very different from
what he finds it, when he has reached it through the
faith and patience of his apostolic labours. There
arc those who reach the shore on broken bits of the
vessel, all but lost, yet saved. While others go
through the u[)lifted gates to the ver}- palace of the
King, with rewards far richer than if thc\' had simply
believed and been saved as by fire. The degree of
glory, then, will be in proportion to the use we make
of grace now. And what an advance from the first
day when we learned to know the grace of God in
truth, to those riper and fuller experiences of a mature
disciple ; and, still more, between this again, and the
plentitude of the heavenly riches that is at God's
right hand — an eternal weight of glory.

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260

GROWTH IN THE DIVINE LIFE.

WHY ARE OUR ATTAINMENTS IN THE DIVINE LIFE
SO UNWORTHY OF OUR ADVANTAGES?

The question is a solemn one ! Why do we remain
so long babes in Christ needing to be fed with milk ?
Why does our Christian manhood remain so long
immature, so that, when we should be teaching others,
we need so much teaching ourselves, as to what are
the first principles of godliness ? Why, in short, do
we remain so long in the primary lessons, without
going on to perfection, exhibiting to the world what
the ripe fruits of the Spirit are, with our light shining
steady and strong, and having our life in its rounded
graces, as a city set on a hill that cannot be hid ?

Many of Christ's professed people bear a blight,
Hke Pharoah's lean kine ; thin and lank, as those ill-
favoured predictions of famine. What a stunted
growth, and what poor specimens many of us are of
renewing grace ! Like trees growing on a sand-bank,
gnarled and bark-bound, and twisted into all manner
of ill shapes! And yet all the time under such a
bright, beautiful heaven. Instead of being laden
down under the abundance of the mellow clusters,
only a blossom is seen here and there that produces
small bunches of withered fruit. Christian workers
labour long and earnestly, while the results are so
disappointing. S')metimes, when we go a-fishing, we
toil all night anu cotch nothing, or, it may be an

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GROWTH IiV THE DIVIXE LIFE.

2G1

insignificant fish not worth taking up! Why do the
disciples of such a Master learn so slowly, and grow
up such poor specinnens of Christian progress, and such
imperfect copies of the grand original ?

All this is owing to the fact that Christian progress
doxjs not enter into our calculations, and forms no
part of our life-long purpose. In short, we do not
lay our plans to grow. In spiritual, as in temporal
things, the hand of the diligent maketh rich, while
we are guilty of sloth and cruel neglect of our most
obvious duty, and then wonder that we are not rich
and increased with goods. Let any man treat his
temporal interests in the same haphazard, half-hearted,
slovenly way that he does his religious obligations,
and very soon he would be landed in the bankrupt
court. In heart-wealth, ni the sweet assurance of
hope, and in the ever-increasing fruits of the Spirit,
it is still the hand of the diligent that maketh rich.
He can no more gain the riches that perish not, with-
out watching unto prayer, than he can gain the riches
of mammon without labour, while, in the ripeness of
Christian character, a believer generally becomes
what he intends to be.

Men like Jonathan Edwards, Baxter, McCheyne,
Chalmers, Burns, of China, etc., or any of those whose
orbit of daily conduct lay near the sun of righteous-
ness, had just that measure of Christian experience

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262

. GROWTH IN THE DIV/VE LIFE.

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and perfection which they hau constantly and
earnestly striven after. They reached the standard
their hearts were set on. They ran with patience,
and looked lovingly unto Jesus, and were daily
transformed into the same image, while the gay, the
worldly, and frivolous have no rich experiences of
saving grace, or heart-felt trust in the Saviour, because
they have never earnestly sought it. They have
neither waited for, nor expected its bestov/ment.
Not till the soul begins to hunger and thirst, and have
a wholesome desire to be fed with the Bread of Life,
can there be any rc.il growth. As we cannot reap
the harvest if we neglect to sow the seed in spring,
so no man can neglect his spiri lal opportunities
without being impoverished ; he cannot shirk his
duty without blunting his conscience ; hu cannot
disobey his Master and still feel right in his h^fi^fi ;
for no man can turn his back on his Saviour without
a shadow coming over his face.

/\nd the sphere of our gtrmih is just where our
llic and duty lie We niust hoxMiHt the Savi(;ur and
§idorn His doctrine, w|lfere our feet are appointed to
walk, and where our hands must do their work. We
must grow in grace just where God's providence has
planted us. \\'c sometimes imas^^ine that this growth
takes place only in church, or at prayer-meeting. But
wherever God's people happen to be, they must never

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GROWTH IN rilE DIVIXE LIFE.

263

cease to reach forth to those things that arc before.
A mother remains at home on the Sabbath to take
care of her Httle infant, and her virtues must grow
amid the cares of the nursery. The man of business
finds his temptations and his victories where he
transacts his business, and has opportunities every day
of showing what manner of man he is. Ti\c labourer
must find an altar, where he toils in the sweat of his
face. And so, in every sphere, men must honour
God, and perfect their Christiar, character where their
work lies, and where temptations meet them.

And let no one complain if it takes long to perfect
some virtues. Provided the fruits are good, do not
grudge the time it takes to mature them. We look
into our garden in the spring-time, and see the brilliant
colour of the crocuses appearing through the snow,
but the rose comes later, and is more beautiful, and a
far more uerfect flower ; the apple, the peach, or pear
tree takes longer to ripen ; the oak requires a centur)-
in order to come to its full stature. So, also, those
graces and virtues in the life of man that are most
durable and precious, ripen slowly, and cost us much
pains, but they arc all of permanent value, and worth
waiting for. And what has simply budded here
below, shall bloom and brighten eternally in that
garden above, where nothing shall hurt or disturb.

On the other hand, how easily the plants and
flowers bud and blossom under the refreshing shower

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264

GROWTH IN THE DIVIXE LIFE.

and the sun's quickening touch. How naturally the
harvests ripen in the fields under favourable wind
and rain ! The fruits of the earth come to perfection
with such seeming ease and quiet. So the growth of
the soul in all Christian knowledge and experience is
under a similar fostering care. When the warm
beams of His love come into the heart, then there is
summer in the soul, and all manner of beauty and of
Divine growths appears. It is so easy to go on to
perfection, when He shines in our heart to give us the
light of the knowledge of the glory of God.

Each immortal soul is as a frail bark freicrhted
with hopes, prayers, and untold interests ; and we
have only one voyage to make ! There is no second
chance to cross those mighty deeps, no return upon
our track to rectify the mistakes we have made.
Therefore* let us steer well and bravely, right onward
to the golden dock of eternity. Let us daily strive
to grow up unto Him who is our Head, knowing
that when we have reached home, we shall be filled
with His fulness and see Him as He is. And then
we shall, for the first time, know that our light
afflictions experienced by the way are not to be
compared Vvith the eternal weight of glory which is
now to be revealed in us.

Now we are before the throne, and serve Him
day and night in His temple : and He that sitteth
on the throne shall dwell among us.

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