صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

66

suddenly from behind, in a moment, a savage buried a tomahawk in her back, and with another stroke nearly severed the head from the body. Death, come it soon or late, tomahawks us very much like that. How will it be with us in that hour, when we, like dear Elmslie-God bless his memory !--shall pass away? How will it be with us? Make haste; let there be no delay in the turning; be quick. Decide for Christ now, now! Now is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation." "To-day, if you will hear His voice, harden not your hearts." Oh, come to Jesus! It is a wonderful experience, conversion. That we should live on, and on, and on, going out from God, until hell's hopeless gates rise on our view, and that we should be stopped, turned, and get a hope of everlasting life through grace! Verily the converted sinner is a man to be wondered at. Then turn, turn; why will ye die ?

[blocks in formation]

God speed your flight into the arms of Christ, here and now! AMEN.

Henderson & Spalding, Printers, 3 & 5, Marylebone Lane, London, W.

THE CURE FOR CARE.

A Sermon

PREACHED AT REGENT SQUARE CHURCH,

SUNDAY MORNING, OCTOBER 12TH,

BY THE

REV. JOHN MCNEILL.

[ocr errors]

TEXT--Philippians iv. 6, 7.

"Be

OUR text begins, if you can break in here (it is hardly fair), but if you can break in at all, at the 6th verse, careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through' or 'in' Christ Jesus." It is a very charming letter, the letter to the Philippians, written by Paul from his captivity in Rome. It is more of a real letter; it is not so much a theological treatise as the Epistle to the Romans. And unlike, for example, the Epistle to the Galatians, it is not a fiery philippic or polemic against his enemies and the "spoilers" of the Gospel. Down towards the end, the "procuring cause" of the Epistle comes out clearly. It is a kind of receipt for money received; but oh, so unlike our commercial receipts! Still, sometimes we manage to write on "With thanks," which is this Epistle, Vol. II.-No. 23.

[ocr errors]

with the "With thanks' very much extended and expanded. The Apostle had been, to use our common phrase, hard-up. There was a rule then for captives by which friends could show their kindness; and these Philippians sent Paul supplies again and again, while others seemed to forget the Apostle. Aye, the very believers in Rome seemed to forget him; those who came out to meet him as far as the Three Forums. When, somehow or another, Paul got into hardships and distress, the deputation seems to have fought shy of him. But, at any rate, the fact remains that if these Philippians had not ministered again and again to his necessities, Paul's comforts would have been very greatly diminished. They remembered him; they had been kind to him; and this is Paul sending back the empty basket—“ the returned empty "—" With thanks ' to those who, by Epaphroditus, had sent it so full. Only he cannot send it quite empty, but puts in this little letter; and we all feel he has more than repaid, infinitely more than repaid, all that ever the Philippians did for him. There are some people, and very independent-minded people they are too, who yet in a matter of giving and receiving show such dignity and gentlemanliness, as to make you feel you are for ever their debtor, because they allowed you to help them in a time of need.

[ocr errors]

Paul so overflows-read the Epistle, and you will feel it better than I can bring it out—he so overflows in his way of giving back his thanks, that he makes the Philippians feel debtors for ever to the recipient of their bounty. See how he runs on: "Rejoice in the Lord alway," says this man, with the chain clanking on his wrist; "Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice. Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand." That

guardsman of his was to Paul a continual reminder of a greater Emperor and a greater Presence. "The Lord is at hand. Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus." We must never take this first expression of our text-I would say-away from the immediate context. "Be over anxious, be full of care for nothing,” seems to be an exaggerated word. Oh, there is something rises in this worldly, anxious, toiling, moiling, industrious heart of ours, and says, "Now, now, now; no more of this, please! We may read it in the Bible; but at the bottom it is a bit of Bible teaching that has not got very far into us." "Take no thought for to-morrow," when we lay our plans far away into next year ? "Take no thought for to-morrow," for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself? Be as free from care as the birds that fly, as the lilies that grow and blow in the sun? "Be full of care for nothing?" And we put our thumbs into our armholes and lean back in the big chair at the office and say, "That's all very well, but it won't do down town." "Be full of care for nothing." "It is an exaggeration, an utter absurdity of other-worldliness." Yes, but when we look at the Bible statement in its own setting, its most soaring utterances become plain, ordinary

common-sense.

"The Lord is at hand." That is the setting. Think of that. Get that great thought into the mind, that the Lord is as near to you as Paul's jailor was to him, with all that that right hand presence represents of being watched, noted, guarded, held strictly in hand for life or death. You are being "shadowed." God is the Shadower; attending your

down-sitting and your uprising: the Judge is at the door.

It is because that utterance is like a thunder-clap that this word comes next. "Be over anxious about nothing." The other day, for example, back there in the summer-time, you were driving through this London, down yonder about the Mansion House corner, and you were saying to your friend on the top of the 'bus, "What a tremendously noisy place London is!" The noise of the streets, the noise of the street-cries, the shrill whistling of the railway engines, piercing through everything, when suddenly the heavens have grown black, and right overhead from the concave of heaven comes the lightning's gleam and the awful crash of thunder. How little London and the Mansion House corner became, when God thus said, "I am at hand." Even down there in all the roar and rattle of this great city, which is the heart of the world, that voice reduces all other things to a mere whisper. So with this text. Do not begin at "Be careful for nothing." Begin at "The Lord is at hand."

Listen to that thunder-clap that breaks in upon our toiling and moiling, and see if your soul does not get quieter if all its earth-born noise and commotions are not overwhelmed by that ear-filling, soul-subduing thought, God is at my door; my Lord is at hand. Therefore, take it easy, in the true sense, and keep a tranquil mind. Therefore, silence, order, attention! Eyes front! "Be full of care for nothing. The Lord is at hand." It is what you have in the 1st of Corinthians, in the 7th chapter, very much the same idea, and working to the same end. The 29th verse: "But this I say, brethren, the time is short," or rather, as the Revised Version would have it, "But this I say, brethren, from henceforth the time is

« السابقةمتابعة »