The Consecration of Courtesy

“Salute every saint in Jesus Christ” (Phil. iv. 21).

And so every conventionality is to be brought within the circle of light, and thereby sanctified. Even the “bells upon the horses” must be “holy unto the Lord.” The apparently unnecessary is to be hallowed. The Apostle does not favour a Christian life in which there is a dark fringe where the trifles of life are thrown together in heedless and thoughtless confusion. Everything in the Christian life must be pervaded by Christian grace and clothed in sacred beauty. Nay, it may justly be said that a man’s growth in grace may be measured by the progressive sanctification of the things “which are least.” The Christian disciple begins with large canvases, he advances

to the small canvas. He draws his picture upon a thumb-nail. He puts the Infinite into the inch.

Therefore I am not surprised that this great epistle is culminating in the sanctification of the common salute, the hallowing of the ordinary courtesies between man and man. And I think the lesson is by no means gratuitous. There are many Christians, whose integrity is unimpeachable, who would yield their life rather than lie, but who are sorely lacking in fine courtesy, in gracious and winsome behaviour. They are never suspected, but they are never liked. Their discipleship is unquestioned, but they are regarded as boors. We describe them as “genuine but rough,” and in our more tolerant moments we seek their symbol in the prickly chestnut burr, with its kernel of sweet and toothsome food. The pity is that there are Christians who make a boast of their roughness, and their want of grace. They obtrude their bluntness as a shopkeeper exposes a favourite article in his window, and they find satisfaction in the exhibition.

Now, we cannot too clearly recognise that all roughness and bluntness suggest that the grace of God is being hindered, and its ministry impaired. It is absolutely sure that “the grace of the Lord Jesus,” if we give it unimpeded sway, will make us perfectly gracious, beautifying even the most conventional relationships of our life. The Lord who spends such infinite pains upon a leaf will not permit a courtesy to go unfinished. And therefore a professing Christian should be as ashamed of roughness as he is of falsehood, of discourtesy as he is of a blazing temper. Truth is grace possessing human speech; courtesy is grace possessing common behaviour; and we limit the Holy One when we hinder His entry into either sphere.

Let us, therefore, bring our “salutes” into the circle of consecration. Let us take our conventionalities, our familiar modes of recognition, our style of address, our manners, and let them all be transfigured by becoming children of light. I am persuaded that there is nothing which would more profoundly impress the world than just the illumination of the ordinary manners of the professing Christian with the grace and light of the Lord Jesus. It is not our severe morals which attract the world, but the winsomeness of our approach. It is surprising how speedily a sweet fragrance arrests men, and causes them to stand in delighted wonder. Some little time ago I heard a working man give this testimony of his master, a master who enjoys a wide fame for his philanthropy: “Ah, sir, but it’s the fine way

he speaks to the likes of me that tells.” And so it is. For “though I give all my goods to feed the poor, and have not love,” a love which proves itself in tender and sensitive discernment, and in exquisite touch, “I am nothing.” Yes, it is the manner of the “salute” which tells.

After all, our intercourse with the majority of men is concerned with very slender relationships, and unless we as Christians can make these slender connections strikingly and startlingly beautiful, we have no further means of bringing “the beauty of the Lord” to bear upon our brethren. It ought to be one of the most radiant distinctions of Christians that we thus enthuse and glorify these threads of communion between us and our fellow-men. The electric energy flows into the flimsiest carbon coil, and transforms its sombre gloom into surpassing brightness. And the energies of grace should flow into thread-like intimacies with our passing brother, and make them so shining and winsome that he shall be arrested with the glory. A Christian’s salute, his “Good morning,” his “Good night,” his “How do you do?” should be distinguished from similar salutes which spring from the lips of men of the world. Our common conventionalities must be made the evangelists of our Lord.

But I must not omit to notice that the Apostle’s counsel is more particularly given to believers in their intercourse with other believers. And surely the counsel is needful and pertinent. I would to God we more diligently practised the salute in the modern Church of Christ. I would that Christians who worship in the same building would become a little more expert in the gracious art of Christian recognition. And I would that Christians who worship in different buildings, and under different forms, would become a little more free and liberal in the Christian salute. How coolly we treat one another; how often we “cut” one another. And the world is looking on. I devoutly pray that the readers of this page may sacredly resolve to foster a more gracious communion, and to reaffirm the old apostolic “salute” as one of the primary graces of the Christian life.