Beginning Well: Introductory
It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of a good beginning in any course of life. Many people spend the latter half of their years in correcting the errors of the earlier half, and by the time they are ready to live the end has come. A good beginning at once turns all the energies into the right channels. No golden years need then be wasted in unlearning false lessons, in revising unwise or impracticable plans or in retracing one’s steps. Many a career of brilliant possibilities is marred by a wrong beginning. There are mistakes of early life which men never get over. A bad foundation has caused the wreck of many a noble building. Inadequate preparation for a business or a calling leads, at the best, to impaired success, and most frequently results, in the end, in utter failure.
These principles apply in Christian life. It is of the utmost importance that we start well. Many Christians walk in doubt and shadow all their days, never entering into rich joy and peace because at the beginning they failed to understand or to realize the blessedness of the privileges to which, as children of God, they are entitled. Many others never attain anything noble and beautiful in Christian life and character because at the beginning they did not wholly disentangle themselves from their old life and fully consecrate themselves to Christ. A good beginning, therefore, involves two things — clearness and definiteness of aim, with intelligent views of the nature and meaning of ih.Q Christian life; and completeness of consecration.
Many men fail in life because they have no settled purpose, no well-defined plan. They have no goal set before them which with all their energies they strive to reach. There is in their mind no clear and distinct idea toward which they struggle. They merely drift on the current, and are borne by it whithersoever it flows. They are not masters in life, but poor slaves. They conquer nothing, but are the mere creatures of circumstance. Such lives, however, are unworthy of intelligent beings endowed with immortal powers, and they never reach any high degree of nobleness or success.
No sculptor touches the marble until he has in t his mind a definite conception of his work as it will appear when it has been finished. He sees a vision before him of a very lovely form, and then sets to work to fashion the vision in the stone. No builder begins to erect a house until a complete plan embracing every detail has been adopted. Before he strikes a stroke he knows *^’ precisely what the finished structure will be. No one would cut into a web of rich and costly cloth until he had before him the pattern of the garment he would make. In all work on material things men have definite aims before they begin their work, and know precisely what they intend to produce.
But in life itself and living, in character-building, in destiny-shaping, many fail to exercise such wisdom. Multitudes never give one earnest thought to such questions as these: “What is my life? For what purpose is it entrusted to me? What ought T to do with it? What should be the great aim of my existence? What should I strive to be and to do?” Thousands live aimlessly, having no true sense of the responsibility of living, never forming an earnest, resolute purpose to rise to any noble height or to achieve any worthy thing. An immortal life should have its aim ever shining before it bright and clear as a star in the heavens. To grow up as a plant — without thought or purpose — is well enough for a plant, and God clothes it and shapes it into marvelous beauty; but men with undying souls and measureless possibilities should have a purpose worthy of their immortality, and should strive with heroic energy to attain it.
No one begins well in life who has not settled in his own mind what, by God’s help, he will strive to do with his life.
In entering the Christian life there should be a clear aim. We should know definitely what this new life is which we have now to live. With but vague ideas of the meaning of a Christian life — its ideal, its requirements, its privileges, the duties which belong to it — no one can begin well. All is vague and misty, and while it is so we cannot put any purpose or energy into our life. We need to understand the new relations into which we come as children of God, in order that we may realize the privileges of our position. We need to have a clear conception of the final aim of all Christian attainment and aspiration, in order that we may strive toward it. We need to know what is required of a Christian toward his God and toward his fellow-men, in order that we laay faithfully and intelligently perform all our duties. We need to know the conditions of Christian life — its needs, its dangers — in order that we may avail ourselves of the necessary helps provided for us. Thus a clear and intelligent aim is essential in beginning well as a Christian.
“Chisel in hand stood a sculptor- boy
With his marble block before him,
And his face lit up with a smile of joy
As an angel-dream passed o’er him. He carved the dream on that shapeless stone
With many a sharp incision; With heaven’s own light the sculpture shone:
He had caught that angel- vision.
“Sculptors of life are we as we stand,
With our souls uncarved before us,
Waiting the hour when, at God’s command,
Our life-dream shall pass o’er us. If we carve it then on the yielding stone
With many a sharp incision,
Its heavenly beauty shall be our own;
Our lives, that angel-vision.”
Besides the clear aim, the other essential thing in beginning well is the devotion and consecration of ourselves to the new life we have chosen. A good ideal is not enough. One may aim an arrow with perfect accuracy, but the bow must also be drawn and the cord let fly if the arrow is to reach the mark. A vision in the brain is not enough for the sculptor: he must hew and chisel the marble into the form of his vision. The architect’s plan is only a picture, and there must be toil and cost until the building stands complete in its noble beauty.
A good aim is not all of a Christian life. It is nothing more than an empty dream unless it be wrought out in Godlike character and Christlike ministry. Every earnest Christian looks much at the glorious Master, and, as he looks, visions of wondrous beauty fill his soul — glimpses of the loveliness of Christ; and he must then seek with patient yet intense purpose to reproduce these heavenly visions in his own life.
Many people have sublimest aspirations and wishes — and even form their aspirations and wishes into intentions and resolves — who yet never take a step toward realizing them. Mere knowing what it is to be a Christian makes no one a Christian; many perish with the glorious ideal shining full and clear before their eyes. Merely seeing the beauty of Christ, as it is held before us for our copying, will never fashion us into that beauty. Our knowledge must be wrought into life. The image our souls see must be fashioned into character. Our good intentions must take form in daily deeds. Knowing Gods will, we must do it with willing heart and diligent hand.
“Make my mortal dreams come true
With the work I fain would do;
Clothe with life the weak intent:
Let me be the thing I meant;
Let me find in thy employ
Peace that dearer is than joy;
Out of self to love be led,
And to heaven acclimated,
Until all things sweet and good
Seem my natural habitude.”