The Christian's Life

“Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?” — Acts ix. 6.

The darkest scenes of our LorcVs history, like a cloud with the moon behind it, shine with a silver lining. For example, he was born in a stable, where, as his dying head was pillowed on thorns, his infant head was pillowed on straw; but then, angels announced the event. Way-worn and weary, he sat on Jacob’s well to beg of a Samaritan a drink of water; but then, he told the astonished woman all her history, and, reading her heart, sent her away on flying feet to cry, Come, see a man who has told me all things that I have ever done. The tumbling sea, the rolling boat, the howling wind, the sheets of spray, could not wake him, so worn out his frame and deep his slumbers; but when he was awakened and rose up, ah, then, “The waters saw thee, 0 God, the waters saw thee;” he said but the word — and moon, and stars, and boat, and girdling mountains lay mirrored on a placid lake. At the grave of Lazarus, groaning like a man and weeping like a woman, he was overcome of grief; but then, he overcame death there. He stood betrayed in the garden, sold by a base disciple for thirty pieces of silver; but then, there

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came a hand out of the darkness that dealt his enemies a blow which sent them staggering, prostrate to the ground.

Thus, amid the deepest meanness, there was a touch of majesty; and his sun set, as it rose, in glory. He died, but who ever died as he? He closed his life amid acts of Godhead: pronouncing pardon with lips pale in death, and with a hand nailed to the cross opening heaven to a penitent thief. Thus his glory, like lightening, shone brighter in the depths of night than in the glare of day. By that, his last, noblest act, we are kept from despair. How has it sent us away to bend over the dying, and, when eyes were glazed, and lips were speechless, to pour into the ear of an expiring profligate, mercy for the chief of sinners! The case of the thief — most illustrious example of the freeness of the grace of God — teaches us to despair nowhere, and of none. I fancy there is no man in this house of a right mind, but breathes freer as he reads it. Brightest trophy of sovereign mercy, and of power omnipotent to save, that thief has led the way of thousands to the gate of heaven; and happy the man that goes in there by the merits of a crucified Saviour, though he goes in at the back of a crucified thief!

As illustrious as that case, is the conversion related in this passage. Since this, in the sudden arrest and conversion of Saul, is as demonstrative of the power as that is of the freeness of the grace of God. Standing on a platform when the train, shooting out of some dark tunnel, dashes by with the rush of an eagle, and the roar of thunder; or, seated upon some lofty rock, when the mountain waye, driven on by the hurricane, and swelling, foaming, curling, bursts, and, passing on either side, rushes to roar along the beach — than these I know no situation, under heaven, where a man more feels his weakness. What hand could stop these flying wheels; or, seizing the billow by its snowy mane, hold it back? Only one — God’s ovn right hand. Great miracle that! A greater is here, in the sudden, instant, omnipotent arrest of Saul. With what impetus he moved on his career; leaving Christ’s other enemies lagging, far behind. A young man, yet stopping at no half measures, but going right at the work of blood, he had already made his name a terror to the whole Church. Dead to pity, nor mother’s tears, nor infant’s cries could move him. A tiger that has tasted blood, he has set out one day anew; and, breathing flames and slaughter against the saints, is rushing on his prey. In a moment, on a sudden, he is arrested in mid-career, changed into a little child; the lion becomes a lamb; the leopard lies down beside the kid. Saul of Tarsus is another man. The hand that bent the arch of heaven has bent his iron will; and, now yielding himself up to Christ, he lies at his feet to say in words, to which I would direct your attention in the hope that God will bend also every stubborn sinner to adopt the language, “Lord” — my God, my Saviour, my sovereign, my all in all — “what wilt thou have me to do?” Before turning your attention to this qaestion I would remark —

I. All men require to undergo the change that was wrought on Saul of Tarsus.

Did you ever see a dead child laid out by tender hands, or even sculjDtured in cold marble? With its air of calm repose, how beautiful it looks! Here death seems divested of his terrors. It looks so living — I had almost said angel-like — that it needs, as it were, but that we should touch it, or speak, to wake it up; and wake again the voice that often cheered a mother’s heart, and woke her from happy slumbers. It is hard to believe that the child is dead; yet there is something harder to believe. With no bad passions stamped on its open brow, an infant looks so guiltless, and is so guileless; looks so innocent, and is so ignorant of evil — that kneeling at a mother’s feet, with sunbeams falling on its golden locks, its little hands held up to heaven, its lips lisping a simple prayer, it is hard, a very hard thing, to believe that this creature is dead in sin; and that, as storms lie sleeping in the calm bosom of the deep, and thunder and lightning in the clear blue heavens, a thousand crimes are sleeping in that infant bosom. Yet so it is. It is dead in sin! and so are we all —” death has passed on all men, because all have sinned.’’

If so, you may say, how useless to speak to sinners! Who speaks to the dead? It seems, in that case, as useless to address unconverted men, as it were for me to go and take my stand in a churchyard, and, turning a grave-stone into a pulpit, address myself to the hollow skulls and mouldering bones around; and in that case preaching seems as mad as a mother’s cries when she hangs over the dead, and, calling her boy by name, implores him to speak to her. Yet, “I am not mad, most noble Festus.” Not mad — no! Have not I seen life spring up under almost as unlikely circumstances? No longer ago than last winter, when the ground lay covered with lingering snows, and the earth lay bare, cold, and wan, like a shrouded corpse, there came a sudden thaw, to reveal what it was most curious and wonderful to see — a plant, fair herald of the spring, had risen up, and leafed, and blown out into full beauty, beneath its snowy crust. Is God less omnipotent in one kingdom than another? My trust is in him who has wrought greater wonders in the realms of grace than in the fields of nature.

True, I am no Christ to repair to the grave, saying, Lazarus, come forth! or go to churchyards with voice as mighty to awake the dead as the dormant. Still, I do not stand here like the king of Israel, when, with the letter in his trembling hand, he looked on the loathsome leper to exclaim. Am I a god, to kill and make alive, that this man is sent to me to be cured of his leprosy? Peter was no “god, to kill or make alive,” yet he entered the lonely chamber; walked up to the pale, dead body; knelt by its side; looked on the fixed and filmy eyes; took the cold hand of Dorcas into his own, and saying, “Damsel, arise!” repeated the miracle of Bethany. Was such power imparted by God to a human voice? then why should I, who am called to speak to dead souls, have less faith than another man, as weak, as fallible, as mortal, who is calVd to speak to a dead body? God can give you lire though you were dead — dead as a grinning skuU. Therefore I preach in the name of him whose heart is love, and whose word is life; who saith, and it is done; who commandeth, and it standeth fast. “Repent,” therefore, “and be converted, every one of you.” Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. Awake, thou that sleepest, and call on thy God! Awake to salvation; time is pressing. Awake to prayer; the door is shutting. Awake to work; the night is falling. Awake to flee; the treacherous tide is creeping round and round you. Awake to believe! who does not, is damned; who does, is saved.

n. Consider what is implied in this question, which every true Christian will be ready to repeat — Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?

1. It implies that every true convert submits himself to the will of Christ. It is not, What will my minister or elders, my parents or family, my neighbours or friends, the wife of my bosom, or children of my heart — but what wilt thou have me to do? This submission to another’s will is the most difficult of things. It is easier, indeed, to bend iron, when it is cold, than a stubborn will; and I will bring you a thousand people in the world who will sooner give up their money than their will to others. Does not every parent in imparting to his child what is the best part of its education, find that to be the most difficult thing he has to do? I say the best part of education. That is not learned at schools, nor found in books; it does not lie in Latin, Greek, or philosophy j it is not communicated by teachers. The boy gets it, or should get it, at home. The best teacher is the parent; and the best lesson he can impart to his children — the best learning he can give them, something far better than the largest fortune, is to take them, one by one, and break the backbone of their self-will. That lies at the foundation of a well-doing family, and makes a happy home; for as one God makes a harmonious universe, so one ruler makes a happy house.

Happy are the children who have early learned the self-denial that, saying No, turns a deaf ear to the syren’s song; withdraws its eyes from viewing vanity; and putting its foot on temptation, crushes out the spark. This is to command fortune, and secure success in life. And happy are the children that, early trained in this virtue, have learned to say to a wise, good. Christian father, what Jesus said to his — “Father, not my will, but thine be done.” This submission to the will of another, the first, best lesson, the battle of the nursery, trains us for the battle of the world, and also the Church. And thus are we to yield our wills to Christ, not saying what would I wish, this one will, or that one say, but What wilt thou have me to do? Say, and I’ll do it, though I should die for it. Give the word. Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth. — In the church, in the place of business, in the family, in the world. What wilt thou have me to do? Henceforth, my will be dead. May I have none but thine!

There is a memorable passage in the history of St. Francis that may throw light on this subject. The grand rule of the order which he founded, was implicit submission to the superior. Well, one day a monk proved refractory. He must be subdued. By order of St. Francis, a grave was dug deep enough to hold a man; the monk was put into it; the brothers began to shovel in the earth; while their superior, standing by, looked on, stern as death. When the mould had reached the wretch’s knees, St. Francis bent down, and, fixing his eye on him, said. Are you dead yet — is your self-will dead — do you yield? There was no answer; down in that grave there seemed to stand a man with a will as iron as his own. The signal was given, and the burial went on. When at length he was buried up to the middle, to the neck, to the lips, St. Francis bent down once more to repeat the question, Are you dead yet? The monk lifted his eye to his superior to see in the cold, grey eyes that were fixed on him no spark of human feeling. Dead to pity, and all the weaknesses of humanity, St. Francis stood ready to give the signal that should finish the burial. It was not needed; the iron bent; he was vanquished; the funeral was stopped; his will yielding to a stronger, the poor brother said, “I am dead.” It has been said that Popery is not so much a contradiction as a denial of the truth; or a caricature of it. It is true. I would not be dead as these monks to any man. The mind and reason which I have got from God Almighty are to bend implicitly and blindly before no human authority. But the submission I refuse to man, Jesus, I give to thee — not wrung from me by terror, but won by love; the result not of fear, but of gratitude. I wish to be dead, not as that monk, hut a.-5 he who said, I am dead; “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live.’’ Saul, the persecuter, was dead; but Paul, the great Apostle, lived. Yet not I, he adds, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

Were it so with us, had we no will of our own, what happy, good, brave, devoted Christians we should be! I have seen a servant come in the morning to his master for orders, and leave to spend the day in executing ihem; and would every man and woman in this house go morning by morning to Christ, saying, with Saul, Lord, wiat wilt thou have me to do this day? there would be no difficulty in getting any amount of money for Christ’s cause; any number of people to do his work, or to make the utmost sacrifices for his cause. Stewards, however thrifty and niggard of their own, do not grudge to pay away their master’s money; and if I, and you, looked on our gold and silver as Christ’s we should never hesitate to part with it for him. I have heard the plough boy whistling in the furrow, and the milk-maid singing at her pail; and, happy as the larks that fill the blue skies above them with their ringing carols, they never fretted because they had to spend the live-long day in their master’s service: nor would we to spend the day, the night, years, our lives, for Christ, did we but feel ourselves to be his servants.

I have read with admiration how a troop of cavahy, dashing at the roaring cannon, would rush on to death: and how the forlorn-hope would throw them’ selves, with a bound and a cheer, into the fiery breach, knowing that should they leave their bodies there — it was the will of their commander. Shall they do that, obedient, amid the shell and shot of battle, to the will of an earthly leader; and shall Christians do less for Christ? Are you your own? body or soul, your own? is anything you call yours, your own? We have one Master in heaven; and if it be true that he bought us with his blood; bought us with his tears; bought us with his thorny crown; bought us with the agonies of Calvary — in the name of God, and truth, and heaven, what right has a Christian to himself? What Christian man or woman should not be ready to say, with this blessed, happy convert — I have done with myself; I no longer live: Jesus, I have no will but thine! Lord, say what am I to do, and I will do it; and, taking up my cross, follow thee whithersoever thou goest. Where thou goest I will go, and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God shall be my God; nought but death — nay, thanks be to God, not death — nothing henceforth shall part me and thee.

2. This question implies that every true convert feels his individual responsibility. It is not only, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? but reading the question otherwise. Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?

In looking over some vast assembly, with its sea of human faces, one reflection naturally suggests itself — in a few years they shall be all mouldering in the dust. There is another and yet more solemn thought; — our

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minds arc carried forward to that day when the gravea of a thousand generations, having given up their dead, all eyes, instead of being turned on a poor mortal man, shall, some beaming with joy and others black with despair, be fixed on the great white throne, and him -that sits crowned thereon. But there is a third thought that presses on me whenever I cast my eyes over some such great assembly, and see all these human faces; it is this, — What power is here! What an immense moral power!

You may smile at him who stood by the catara-ct of Niagara as, gathering her waters from a hundred lakes, she rolled them over with the roar of a hundred thunders; and who, instead of being filled with a sublime admiration of the scene, began to calculate how much machinery that water-power would turn. You may smile at that utilitarianism. But it is a serious, solemn, stirring thought to think how much moral machinery all this power now before me could turn for good, were every scheming brain, and busy hand, and willing heart, engaged in the service of God. I hope many of you are active, zealous Christians. But were all of us so, — were all Christian men and women so, what honor would accrue to God! what a revenue of glory to Jesus Christ, and what invaluable service to religion! Thousands on thousands might be saved!

It is impossible to over-estimate, or rather to estimate the power that lies latent in our churches. We talk of the power latent in steam — latent till Watt evoked its spirit from the waters, and set the giant to turn the iron arms of the machinery. Wo talk of the powers that was latent in the skies till science climbed their heights, and, seizing the spirit of the thunder, chained it to our surface — abolishing distance; outstripping the wings of time; and jflashing our thoughts across rolling seas to distant continents. Yet what are these to the moral power that lies asleep in the congregations of our country, and of the Christian world? And why latent? Because men and women neither appreciate their individual influence, nor estimate aright their own individual responsibilities. They cannot do everything; therefore, they do nothing. They cannot blaze like a star; and, therefore, they won’t shine like a glow-worm; and so they are content that the few work, and that the many look on. Not thus are the woods clothed in green, but by every little leaf expanding its own form. Nor thus that fields are covered with golden corn, but by every stalk of grain ripening its own head. Nor thus does the coral reef rise from the depths of ocean, but by every little insect building its own rocky cell.

You say, what can I do? oh, I have no power, nor influence, nor name, nor talents, nor money! Look at the coral reef, yonder, where it encircles the fair isles that lie like bright gems on the bosom of the Pacific; or, by Australian shores, stretches its unbroken wall for a thousand leagues along the sea. How contemptible the architects; yet the aggregate of their labours, mocking our greatest breakwaters, how colossal! So it ought to be, and would be, in our congregations, were every man and every woman to feel their own individual responsibilities; would each go to Christ, saying, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? — would they but rise to the height of their calling. I know that all cannot be bright and burning lights; that honour is reserved for John Baptist and a few such men. But see how that candle in a cottage window sends out its rays streaming, far through the depths of night. Why should not we shine, though but like that? — shine, though it should be to illumine only the narrow walls of our country’s humblest home.

Consider how the greatest things ever done on earth, have been done by little and little — little agents, little persons, and little things. How was the wall restored around Jerusalem? By each man, whether his house was an old palace or the rudest cabin, building the breach before his own door. How was the soil of the New World redeemed from gloomy forests? By each sturdy emigrant cultivating the patch round his own log cabin. How have the greatest battles been won? Not by the generals, who got their breasts blazoned with stars, and their brows crowned with honours; but by the rank and file — every man holding his own post, and ready to die on the battle-field. They won the victory! It was achieved by the blood and courage of the many; and I say, if the world is ever to be conquered for our Lord, it is not by ministers, nor by office-bearers, nor by the great, the noble, and mighty; but by every man and woman, every member of Christ’s body, being a working member; doing their own work; filling their own sphere; holding their own post; and saying to Jesus, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And, indeed, when all is done, I venture to say of the busiest man that, when he lies on a dying bed, and grim death stands over him, his won’t be the pleasant reflection, How much have I done? but rather the regretful thought, How much have I left undone? how many more sinners might I have warned; how many more wretched might I have blessed; how many more naked might I have clothed; how many more poor might I have fed; how many in hell may be cursing my want of faithfulness; how few in heaven are blessing God for my Christian, kind fidelity! Ah, the best of us will be thankful to be taken to glory, not as profitable servants, but as sinners saved.

3. It implies that the life of the true convert will be one of deeds.

It is not only. Lord, what wilt thou have me to do; and Lord, what wilt thou have me to do; but this also, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? to do; not, observe and mark, to believe or to profess, but to do.

I do not stand here to set deeds against doctrines, or to exalt the one at the expense of the other. Nor have I any sympathy with the fashion, so common now-a-days, of setting small value on creeds; saying. It matters little what a man believes, if he does right. A man cannot do right unless he believes right. The thing is impossible, and as contrary to true philosophy as religion, since every effect must have a cause, and every stream a spring; nor can water rise above its fountain, and according to the character of the foimtain, so will be that of the water it discharges. 1 know as well as others that doctrines are not deeds; that dogmas are not lives; that tl>3 foundation is not the superstructure. Yet that night when the rains descend, and the floods rise, and the winds blow, happy is the man whose storm-beaten house stands founded on a rock; he may go to bed amid the wild uproar of elements, and sleep in peace; and happy, happier still, the man, when the hour comes which shall sweep away all confidence in human merits, whose hopes of salvation stand on the Rock of Ages, secure on the work and death of Christ.

Calls creeds, as some do, mere skeletons; and doctrines and dogmas but the bones, and not the livings lovely, breathing form of true religion. Still I turn round to ask. What were the body without the bones? are not these an essential part of the animal system; maintaining our form erect, imparting to it its symmetry, giving these feet their power to walk, these hands their power to work? Not less important the place that doctrines hold, the part they play; and therefore I say, hold fast the profession of your faith; stand fast in the truth; be steadfast, immovable, valiant for the truth; be charitable and courteous, yet earnestly contending for the faith once delivered to the saints.

Still faith without works is dead; dead, in the judgment of an apostle; worse than dead, an offence; a cause of disgust like a dead body, stinking in the nostrils of the church and even of the world. Of what use is faith without works: doctrine without deeds?

Of no more use than trees without fruit, or clouds without water. Useless the creeds that do not influence our conduct; the preaching that leads to no practice; the Sabbath that impart no impulse heavenward which extends along the running week, nor by the rest of the seventh day brace us up for the toils of the six. Prayer meetings, sermons, religious services, are good; but they are not, as some make them, banquets where you are to enjoy yourselves and gratify your taste — like a man who sits down at a sumptuous feast to please his palate, and fill his belly. This is not to use but to abuse them. Would you see their proper use? Look at yon hardy and sun-burned man, sitting down in his cottage to a simple meal; and rising from the table to spend the strength it gives him at the plough, the spade, the labours of the field. So Sabbaths with their sermons, week-days with their occasional religious services, are to strengthen us for work — otherwise our religion is no less selfish than the lives of thousands, gourmands and epicures, who eat and drink for no higher purpose than their own pleasure. Our object should be to get strength to do God’s work in this world; and to follow, at however great a distance, the steps of Him who, as our pattern as well as propitiation, went about continually doing good. I am sure that Christ is the propitiation of none of whom he is not also the pattern; and that on the last great day you shall never be asked what church you attended? to what denomination you belonged? what was your confession or creed? No! It is fruit, not leaves nor even flowers, that is the test of the tree. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit shall be cut down, and cast into the fire.

Alive to this, what good we should do! how busy we should be! There would be no time for sin; little even for rest. Rest? We have often thought we should like a time of rest, ere leaving this busy world — a quiet corner, in the decline of life, like the straw or twig that, after being tossed about in the roaring torrent, floats aside into a smooth and placid pool, to sail round and round in seeming, serene enjoyment. But rest! what have we to do with that? From his cradle to the grave, did Christ ever rest? Does God ever rest? “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work,” said our Lord. If you must have rest, wait a little while: your weary body will find it in the grave, and your spirit in yon blessed skies. Earth for work, heaven for wages — this life for the battle, another for the crown — time for employment, eternity for enjoyment. “There remaineth a rest for the people of God.” Rise then to the duties and dignity of your Christian calling! Let every man and woman, I and you, the humblest of you, feel that they have a mission, a great mission on earth. Till then let us work at our mission; seeking to make this wretched world better than we found it, and, in good and holy works, to leave our “footprints on the sands of time.”

Are you saved yourself? seated above the boiling sea, safe on the Rock of Ages? Then reach down your hand to pull up this, and that other drowning wretch. I would rather see a man, with eager eye and outstretched arm, bending down to draw others up on the rock, than see him on his knees thanking God for his own escape and safety — the one were more God’s work than the other. Christian men and women! the misery of this world, the sorrows you can heal, the wretchedness you can relieve, the habits you can improve, the wrongs you can redress, the happiness you can bestow, the souls you can save, call you to work.

And what the love of Christ requires, and the Bible enjoins, its revelations of the future encourage us to do. Grand prophecies wait fulfilment. The world’s best days are yet to come. Whether we help it on or not, the time approaches when eager crowds shall throng the gates of mercy, and sinners shall flee to their Saviour like doves to their windows — and not politically only but spiritually, nations shall be born in a day — and converts be numerous in this island, and over all the world, as the dews that from the womb of the morning top every spike of grass, and hang, like pendant diamonds, sparkling on every branch. Lend your prayers, your money, your time, your help in every form to that glorious cause. Go, work: work for the God that loved you; work for the Saviour that bled for you; work for the world that, sinking, appeals to you for help — your motto “The love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.”