Division 3>S 2-7 "^-^ 
 
 Section . I 
 
k 
 
THE 
 
 PRACTICAL COMMENTARY 
 
 on tKe 
 
 Nov Testament 
 
 Edited bx 
 
 W. Robertson Nicoll 
 M.A.. LL.D. 
 
The 
 
 PRACTICAL 
 
 COMMENTARY 
 On the New Testament 
 
 Edited by 
 
 W.ROBERTSON NICOLL, LL.D., D.D. 
 
 Editor of "The Expoiitor's .Bible" 
 
 Volume I. Colossians and Thessalonians. 
 
 Volume II. Ephesians, 
 Volume III. Peter, 
 Volume IV. Revelation, 
 
 Others to he announced. 
 
 Joseph Parker, D.D. 
 Joseph Parker, D.D. 
 J. H. Jovvett 
 C Anderson Scott 
 
 These volumes are the first to be announced of a 
 great new undertaking similar to the universally 
 known Expositor's Bible. It will be under the direc- 
 tion of the editor of that great work, Dr. W. Robert- 
 son Nicoll, editor of the British Weekly, and its 
 volumes will be the work of the foremost living theo- 
 logians. Thoroughly alive to the necessity of taking 
 advantage of every help that modern scholarship 
 offers, this commentary will at the same time retain 
 a healthy conservatism of judgment, and its field of 
 usefulness will therefore be as large as its great fore- 
 runner, " The Expositor's Bible." 
 
 Every volume of this set will be printed on spe- 
 cially made paper, handsomely and strongly hound in 
 extra cloth, size crown octavo. 
 
 Price per volume, ?i.25, Net 
 
THE EPISTLES 
 OF ST. PETER 
 
 9/the Rev. 
 J. H.^JO\VETT, MA. 
 
 Author of "Apostolic Optimism," etc. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 A. C. ARMSTRONG & SON 
 
 3 & 5 West 18th Street, near 5th Avenue 
 1906 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 CHAP. VEKSK PAGE 
 
 I. 3-5. The Possibilities and Dynamics of 
 
 THE EeuENERATE LiFE , , , 1 
 
 I. 6, 7. Sorrowful, yet always Rejoicing . 11 
 
 I. 8, 9. A Twofold Relationship and its 
 
 FiuiTs 24 
 
 I. 13-16. Being Fashioned .... 34 
 
 I. 17-21. The Holiness of the Father . . 45 
 
 I. 22-25. The Creation of Culture and 
 
 Affection 56 
 
 II. 1-10. The Living Stones and the Spiritual 
 
 House 67 
 
 II. 11-17. The ^Tixistry of Seemly Behaviour 78 
 
 V 
 
vi CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. VEESK PAGE 
 
 II. 21-25. The Sufferings of Christ • • 90 
 
 III. 1-8. Wives and Husbands • . • 102 
 
 III. 8. " Be Pitiful "(" Tenderhearted ") . lU 
 
 III. 8-15. Christ sanctified as Lord . ,126 
 
 III. 18-22. Bringing us to God .... 138 
 
 IV. 1-6. The Suffering which means Triumph 150 
 IV. 7-11. Getting Keady for the End . .161 
 IV. 12-19. The Fiery Trial . . . .173 
 
 V. 1-7. Tending the Flock .... 181 
 
 V. 8-10. Through Antagonisms to Perfeotness 193 
 
CONTENTS vii 
 
 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 CHAP. VERSE p^Cj, 
 
 I. 1,2. Liberty! Equality! Fraternity! . 205 
 
 I. 1-4. The Christian's Resources . .213 
 
 I. 5-9. Diligence in the Spirit . . ^ 227 
 
 L 12-15. The Sanctification of the Memory. 237 
 
 I. 16-18. The Transfigured Jesus . , , 249 
 
 I. 19-21. The Mystery op the Prophet . . 263 
 
 n. 1. Destructive Heresies . , .279 
 
 II. 20, 21. Worse than the First . . .296 
 
 III. 3,4,8^. The Leisureliness of God , . 307 
 
 III. 10-14. Preparing for the Judgment . . 321 
 
 III. 18. Growing in Grace .... 334 
 
THE POSSIBILITIES AND DYNAMICS OF 
 
 THE REGENERATE LIFE 
 
 1 Peter i. 3-5 
 
 Blessed he the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christy 
 who according to His great mercy begat us again unto a 
 living hope by the resurrection of Jesv^ Christ from the 
 dead, unto an inheHtance inco^'rujdible, and imd( filed, and 
 that fadtth wA away, reserved in heaven for you^ who by 
 the power of God are gicarded through faith unto a salvation 
 ready to be revealed in the last time. 
 
 How easily these early disciples break into 
 doxology ! Whenever some winding in the 
 way of their thought brings the grace of 
 God into view, the song leaps to their lips. The 
 glory of grace strikes the chords of their hearts 
 into music, and life resounds with exuberant 
 praise. It is a stimulating research to study the 
 birthplaces of doxologies in the apostolic writ- 
 ings. Sometimes the march of an argument is 
 stayed while the doxology is sung. Sometimes 
 the Te Deum is heard in the midst of a pro- 
 cession of moral maxims. The environment of 
 the doxology varies, but the operative cause 
 which gives it birth is ever the same. From 
 
 1 
 
2 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the height of some ascending argument, or 
 through the lens of some ethical maxim, the 
 soul catches a glimpse of the " riches of His 
 grace," and the wonderful vision moves it to 
 inevitable and immediate praise. I am not sur- 
 prised, therefore, to find the doxology forming 
 the accompaniment of a passage which con- 
 templates the glory and the privileges of the 
 re-created life. It is a Te Deum sung during 
 the unveiling of the splendours of redeeming 
 grace. Let us burn our eyes to the vision 
 which has aroused the grateful song. 
 Verse 3 " Blessed be the God and Father . . . who begat 
 us againJ^ " Begat again." That is one of the 
 unique phrases of the Christian vocabulary. It 
 is not to be found in systems of thought which 
 are alien from the Christian religion. It is not to 
 be found in the vocabulary of any of the modern 
 schools which are severed from the facts and 
 forces of the Christian faith. The emphasis 
 of their teaching gathers round about terms 
 of quite a different order, such as culture, 
 training, discipline, education, evolution. The 
 Christian religion has also much to say about 
 the process of evolution. It dwells at length 
 upon the ministries of " growth," " training," 
 "increasing," "putting on," "perfecting." But 
 while it emphasises " growth," it directs our 
 attention to " birth." While it magnifies the 
 
CHAPTER I. 3-5 3 
 
 necessity of wise culture, it proclaims the 
 necessity of good seed. So while the Bible 
 lags behind no school in urging the importance 
 of liberal culture, it stands alone in proclaiming 
 the necessity of right germs. You cannot by 
 culture develop the thorn-bush into a ladened 
 vine. You cannot by the most exquisite dis- 
 cipline evolve " the natural man " into the 
 " measure of the stature of the fulness of 
 Christ." If we had merely to do with per- 
 verted growths, then the trainer and pruner 
 might twist the crooked straight. But we are 
 confronted with more than perverted growths; 
 we have to do with corrupt and rotting seed. 
 If all we needed was the the purification of 
 our conditions, then the City Health Department 
 might lead us into holiness. But we need more 
 than the enrichment of the soil ; we need the 
 revitalising of the seed. And so the Christian 
 religion raises the previous question. It begins 
 its ministry at a stage prior to the process of 
 evolution. It discourses on births and genera- 
 tion, on seeds and germs, and proclaims as its 
 primary postulate, " ExcejDt a man be born 
 again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of 
 God." 
 
 Now, man is not enamoured of that dogmatic 
 postulate. It smites his pride in the forehead. 
 It lays himself and his counsels in the dust. 
 
4 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 It expresses itself in an alien speech. Men are 
 familiar with the word '' educate " ; the alien 
 word is " regenerate." Political controversy has 
 familiarised them with the word ''reform" ; the 
 alien word is " transfigure." They have made 
 a commonplace of the word " organise " ; the 
 alien word is " vitalise." They have made 
 almost a fetish of the phrase " moral growth " ; 
 the alien word is " new birth." And so we 
 do not like the strange and humbling postulate ; 
 but whether we like it or not, the heart of 
 every man bears witness to the truth and 
 necessity of its imperative demand. Man be- 
 comes incredulous of the necessity of the new 
 birth when he surveys the lives of others, but 
 not when he contemplates his own. "We gaze 
 upon the conduct and behaviour of some man 
 who is dissociated from the Christian Church, 
 or who indeed is hostile or indilTerent to the 
 Christian faith. We mark the integrity of his 
 walk, the seemliness of his behaviour, the 
 purity of all his relationships, the evident lofti- 
 ness of his ideals, and we then project the 
 sceptical inquiry, Does this man need to be 
 begotten again ? I do not accept one man's 
 judgment as to the necessity of another man's 
 regeneration. I wish to hear a man's judgment 
 concerning himself. I would like a man to 
 be brought face to face with the life of Jesus, 
 
CHAPTER 1. 3-^ B 
 
 witH all its searching and piercing demands, 
 and with all its marvellous ideals, so marvellously 
 attained, and I would like the man's own judg- 
 ment as to what would be required before he 
 himself, in the most secret parts of his life, is 
 clothed in the same superlative glory. I think 
 it is impossible to meet with a single uncon- 
 verted man who does not know that, if ever 
 he is to wear the glory of the Son of God, and 
 to be chaste and illumined in his most hidden 
 thoughts and dispositions, there will have to 
 take place some marvellous and inconceivable 
 transformation. Let any man gaze long on 
 ''the unsearchable riches of Christ," and then 
 let him slowly and deliberately take the in- 
 ventory of his own life, and I am persuaded he 
 will come to regard the vaunted panaceas of 
 the world as altogether secondary, he will rele- 
 gate its vocabulary to the secondary, and he 
 will welcome as the only pertinent and adequate 
 speech, " Ye must be born again." 
 
 Into what manner of life are we begotten 
 again ? What is the range of its possibilities, 
 and the spaciousness of its prospects ? The 
 apostolic doxology winds its way among a 
 wealth of unveiled glories. 
 
 " Blessed be the God . . . who begat us again Verse 3 
 tinto a living hope^ It is a hope afHuent in 
 life. It is a vivifying hope. There are hopes 
 
6 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 that are inoperative, ineffective, uninfluential. 
 They generate no energy. They impart no 
 power to work the mill. But the spiritual hope 
 of the redeemed is living and life-creating, ope- 
 rating as a vital stimulus upon the consecrated 
 race. How the Bible exults in the use of this 
 great characteristic word : " Living Bread ! " 
 " Living Water ! " " Living Fountains ! " " The 
 Living God ! " The word conveys the suggestion 
 of superabundant life, exuberant energy, an over- 
 flowing vitaHty. It quickens the sentiments. " "We 
 rejoice in hope." The dispositions dance in the 
 radiant light ! It vitalises the thought. The mind 
 which is inspired by the glorious expectation is 
 grandly secure against the encroachment of the 
 evil one. Hope-inspired thought is its own de- 
 fence. It energises the ivill. The great hope feeds 
 the will, vivifies it, makes it steadfast and un- 
 movable. Into all this powerful hope are we 
 begotten again by the abundant mercy of God. 
 Verse 4 " Begat us again . . . u7ito an inheritance J ^ 
 With our regeneration we become heirs to a 
 glorious spiritual estate, with all its inexhaust- 
 ible possessions and treasures. How the apostles 
 roll out the New Testament music by ringing 
 the changes upon this eagerly welcomed word ! 
 *' Heirs of salvation ! " " Heirs of the king- 
 dom ! " *' Heirs together of the grace of life ! " 
 " Heirs according to the hope of eternal life ! " 
 
CHAPTER I. 3-5 7 
 
 The apostles survey their estate from different 
 angles, that they may comprehend the wealth 
 of the vast inheritance. With what fruitful 
 words does the Apostle Peter characterise the 
 nature of these possessions ! It is an inherit- 
 ance "incorruptible." It is beyond the reach 
 of death. No grave is ever dug on this estate. 
 It is an inheritance " undefiled." It is beyond 
 the taint of sin. No contamination ever stains 
 its driven snow. The robes of the glorified are 
 whiter than snow. It is an inheritance "that 
 fadeth not away." It is beyond the blight of 
 change. The leaf never turns. " Time does 
 not breathe on its fadeless bloom." Into this 
 glorious inheritance are we begotten again 
 by the abundant mercy of God. 
 
 " Begat us again . . . unto a salvation ready verse 5 
 to be revealed in the last timey Here comes 
 in the graciousness of spiritual evolution. 
 All the steps on the work of salvation are 
 "ready," right away to the ultimate con- 
 summation. There has been no caprice in 
 the arrangements. There need be no uncer- 
 tainty in the expectations. There has been no 
 defect in the preparations. There is no lack in 
 the resources. "What is needed for the ripening 
 of the redeemed character has been provided. 
 At every step of the way " all things are ready." 
 The glorious possibilities range from the seed 
 
8 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 to the ''full corn in the ear"; from the new 
 birth to the ''salvation ready to be revealed 
 in the last time." Such is the inspiring 
 prospect, and such are some of the glorious 
 possibilities of the redeemed and re-created 
 life. 
 
 We have searched this glowing doxology 
 for glimpses of the new-begotten life. We 
 have gazed upon its fascinating range of 
 possibilities. Has it any suggestion to offer 
 of the dynamics by which these alluring possi- 
 bilities may be achieved? I have already 
 dwelt upon the vitalising energy which flows 
 from its living hope. Are there other sugges- 
 tions of empowering dynamics by which even 
 the loftiest spiritual height may be scaled ? Let 
 us glance at some of these suggested powers. 
 Verses ^'According to His great mercy. '^ I am glad 
 and grateful that the pregnant passage is 
 prefaced by this word. The regenerated soul 
 is just enveloped in "great mercy." Now 
 mercy implies sympathy. We cannot have 
 mercy without sympathy. Without mercy we 
 cannot have leniency ; but leniency is only 
 thin, pinched fruit compared with the fat, juicy 
 fruit of mercy. Without sympathy we may 
 have giving, but unsympathetic giving is like 
 the cold, outer threshold, while mercy is like a 
 glowing hearthstone. Mercy implies sympathy. 
 
CHAPTER I. 3-5 9 
 
 Go a step further. Sympathy suggests the 
 choicest companionship, the rarest of all fellow- 
 ships. Where there is true sympathy, there is 
 the most exquisite companionship. If, then, 
 our God and Father enswathes us in ''great 
 mercy," He visits in the sweetest fellowships. 
 Therefore in the redeemed life there can be 
 no loneliness, for in the Father's presence all 
 possible loneliness is destroyed. The mercy 
 which implies companionship accompanies me 
 as a dynamic from my faintest breathing as 
 a babe-Christian on to the consummation when 
 I shall have become a full-grown man in 
 Christ. 
 
 ^^ Begat us again . . . by the resurrection 0/ Verse 3 
 Jesus Christ from the dead.'' His resurrection 
 opens to me the doors of the immortal life. 
 If He had not risen, my hope had never been 
 born. The breaking up of His grave means 
 the breaking up of man's winter, and the soit 
 approach of the eternal spring. Because He 
 has risen, death no longer counts ! That Life, 
 which in death defeated death, and converted 
 " the place of a skull " into the altar of the 
 people's hope, is the dynamic of the regenerate 
 soul, and makes the life invulnerable. 
 
 " By the poiuer of God guarded unto salvation.'^ Verse 5 
 Here is another aspect of the gracious energy 
 which enables me to convert possibilities into 
 
10 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 achievements. I am " guarded." The " power 
 of God" defends me, hems me in, and secures 
 me from every assault. My Father's power 
 is my garrison. He engirdles me, like a de- 
 fensive army occupying a city wall, and makes 
 me invincible against the menace and attacks 
 of the devil. "As the mountains are round 
 about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about 
 His people." Such are the adequate resources, 
 and such the wonderful equipments of the re- 
 generate life. The land that stretches before 
 us is glorious. The power to possess it is 
 equally glorious. They may both be ours " by 
 faith." 
 
SOEEOWFUL, YET ALWAYS 
 EEJOICING 
 
 1 Peter i. 6, 7 
 
 Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, 
 if need be, ye have been put to grief in manifold trials^ 
 that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold 
 that perisheth though it is proved by fre^ might be found 
 unto praise and glory and honour at the revelation of Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 " Wherein ye greatly rejoice ! " These foun- 
 tains of spiritual joy slioot into the light at 
 most startling and unexpected places. Their 
 favourite haunt seems to be the heart of the 
 desert. They are commonly associated with 
 a land of drought. In these Scriptural records 
 I so often find the fountain bursting through 
 the sand, the song lifting its psean out of 
 the night. If the text is a well of cool and 
 delicious water, the context is frequently 
 arid waste. " Wherein ye greatly rejoice^ yerse 6 
 though now . , , ye have been put to griefs 
 A present rejoicing set in the midst of an 
 environing grief ! A profound and refreshing 
 
 11 
 
12 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 satisfaction, even when the surface of the life 
 is possessed by drought ! I never expected to 
 find a fountain in so unpromising a waste. 
 "Blessed are ye when men shall revile you 
 and persecute you, and shall say all manner 
 of evil against you falsely for my sake. 
 E-ejoice ! " Who ever expected to find a 
 well in that Sahara? As I trod the hot burn- 
 ing sands of " reviling " and " persecuting " 
 and false accusing, little did I anticipate en- 
 countering a fountain of spiritual delight. Let 
 us once again contemplate the strange con- 
 junction. " Woe unto thee, Bethsaida ! Woe 
 unto thee, Chorazin! Woe unto thee, Caper- 
 naum ! " This on the one hand. And on the 
 other hand, "A certain lawyer stood up, and 
 tempted Him." And between the two, " Jesus 
 rejoiced in the Spirit." Again, I say, I am 
 amazed at the setting. If life were a prolonged 
 marriage-feast, one might anticipate hearing 
 the happy bells at every corner of the way; 
 but to hear the joyous peal in the hour of 
 grievous midnight and eclipse arrests the 
 heart in keen and strained surprise. " These 
 things have I said unto you, that My joy 
 may be in you." "My joy!" And yet 
 Calvary loomed only a hand's-breadth off, 
 just twenty-four hours away! I thought 
 the joy bells might have been heard away 
 
CHAPTER I. 6, 7 13 
 
 back in Nazareth, in the beauty and serenity 
 of a secluded village life, or on some quiet 
 evening, with His friends on the Galilean 
 lake ; but I never anticipated hearing them at 
 Calvary's base, in full view of shame and 
 crucifixion. '' My joy ! " " One of you shall 
 betray Me." It is a marvellous conjunction, but 
 one which is almost a commonplace in the 
 Christian Scriptures. " They received the word 
 in much affliction, with joy in the Holy Ghost." 
 It is a mysterious, yet glorious wedlock. 
 *' Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now . . . 
 ye have been put to grief." What is the sug- 
 gestion of this apparently forced and incon- 
 gruous union ? The suggestion is this, that the 
 spiritual joy of the redeemed life is continuous, 
 and is not conditioned by the changing moods 
 of the transient day. Spiritual delights are not 
 dried up when I pass into the seasons of mate- 
 rial drought. When the shadows settle down 
 upon my life, and my experiences darken into 
 night, the night is not to be without its cheery 
 and illuminating presence. The place of the 
 midnight is to be as "the land of the mid- 
 night sun." There shall be light enough to 
 enable me to read the promises, to see my way, 
 and to perceive the gracious presence of my 
 Lord. " He that f olloweth Me shall not walk in 
 darkness, but shall have the light of life." 
 
14 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 Therefore the shadow need not annihilate my 
 joy. My temporary grief need not expunge 
 my spiritual delights. The funeral knell of 
 bereavement may be tolling in the outer 
 rooms of the life, while in the most secret 
 places may be heard the joy bells of trustful 
 communion with God. " Wherein ye greatly 
 rejoice, though now ... ye have been put 
 to grief." 
 Verse 6 ''Wherein ye greatly rejoice." If our 
 spiritual joy is to be continuous and per- 
 suasive, sending its pure vitalising ray even 
 through the season of grief, we shall have 
 to see to it that it is adequately nourished 
 and sustained. Now, the nutriment of joy 
 is to be found in appropriate thought. Hap- 
 piness is usually the resultant of sensations, 
 the ephemeral product of sensationalisms, 
 having the uncertain life of the things on 
 which it depends. Joy is the product of deep, 
 quiet, steady, appropriate thought. Thought 
 provides the oxygen in which the bright, 
 cheery flame of love is sustained. What 
 kind of thought is required? ''Wherein ye 
 rejoice"! In what? The rejoicing emerges 
 from an atmosphere of thought— the thought 
 which is contained in the previous verses, 
 and which formed the basis of our last 
 exposition. It is a contemplation of the 
 
CHAPTER I. 6, 7 15 
 
 possibilities and dynamics of tlie redeemed 
 life. The possibilities stretch away in a most 
 glorious and alluring panorama : " a living 
 hope " ; "an inheritance incorruptible and 
 undefiled, and that fadeth not away " ; "a 
 salvation ready to be revealed in the last 
 time." The dynamics are no less wealthy 
 than the prospects : the " great mercy " of 
 the Father ; " the resurrection of Jesus from 
 the dead " ; " the power " of the Holy Ghost ! 
 These constitute the oxygenating thought of 
 the Christian redemption. If the soul be im- 
 mersed in it, faint sparks will be kindled into 
 fervent flames, and timid desires will be 
 strengthened into confident rejoicing. "As I 
 mused, the fire burnt." Let mind and heart 
 make their home in the spacious thoughts 
 of God, and there will be born in the life 
 a moral and spiritual glow which will not 
 be chilled by any transient cloud, nor 
 extinguished by the storms of the most 
 tempestuous night. "Wherein ye greatly 
 rejoice." 
 
 " Though now for a little while, if need be, 
 ye have been put to grief in manifold trials ^ verse 6 
 The " manifold trials " will come. Antago- 
 nisms may rush down upon us from north, 
 south, east, and west, and may twist and 
 wrench our lives into strange bewilderments, 
 
16 THE FmST EPISTLE OP PETER 
 
 and yet the continuous thread of spiritual 
 rejoicing need never be broken. Our affairs 
 may be tossed into incredible complications, 
 and yet "the joy of the Lord may be our 
 strength." The pleasing air of music, which 
 in its simplicity a child might hum, may 
 appear to be lost as it passes into the maze of 
 tortuous variations and complications, but an 
 expert ear can detect the continuity of the 
 primal air beneath all the accretions of the 
 voluminous sound. The air of simple spiritual 
 rejoicing, which may be clearly heard when life 
 is plain and serene, may be continued when 
 life becomes complex and burdened, torn and 
 harassed by "manifold trials." We may still 
 hear the sweet primitive air of Christian re- 
 joicing. I am not surprised to hear the sounds 
 of rejoicing from Paul's life, when he was 
 holding precious and sanctified intercourse with 
 such beloved friends as Prisca and Aquila. But 
 when the apostle is "put to grief through 
 manifold trials," and life becomes dark, heavy, 
 and complicated, how will it fare with him then ? 
 " The gaoler thrust them into the inner prison, 
 and made their feet fast in the stocks. And 
 it came to pass that at the midnight "—that is 
 what I want to know about — " at the mid- 
 night Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises 
 unto Grod." It is the old air, rising through 
 
CHAPTER I. 6, 7 17 
 
 the pains and burden of a harassed and 
 sorely tried life. "As sorrowful, yet always 
 rejoicing." 
 
 Now, these "manifold trials" assume many 
 guises and employ varied weapons of painful 
 inquisition. Some of them may be found in 
 the antagonism of men. Loyalty to truth may 
 be confronted with persecution. A beautiful 
 ministry may be given an evil interpretation. 
 Our beneficence may be maligned. Our very 
 leniency may be vituperated and proclaimed 
 as a device of the devil. This may be one 
 of the guises of "the manifold trials." Or 
 our antagonism may be found in the apparent 
 hostility of our circumstances. Success is denied 
 us. Every way we take seems to bristle with 
 difficulties. Every street we enter proves to 
 be a cul de sac. We never emerge into an airy 
 and spacious prosperity. We pass our days in 
 material straits. Such may be another of the 
 guises of "the manifold trials." Or it may 
 be that our antagonist dwells in the realm of 
 our own flesh. We suffer incessant pain. We 
 are just a bundle of exquisite nerves. The 
 streets of the city are instruments of torture. 
 The bang of a door shakes the frail house to 
 its base. We are the easy victims of physical 
 depression. Who knows but that this may have 
 been Paul's "thorn in the flesh"? At any 
 
18 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 rate, it is one of " the manifold trials " by 
 which many of our brethren are put to grief. 
 I will go no further with the enumeration, 
 because I am almost impatient to once again 
 declare the evangel which proclaims that be- 
 hind aU these apparent antagonisms we may 
 have the unceasing benediction of the joy of 
 our Lord. It is possible — I declare it, not as 
 my personal attainment, but as a glorious pos- 
 sibility which is both yours and mine — it is 
 possible to get so deep into the thought and 
 purpose of God, and to dwell so near His 
 very heart, as to " count it all joy " when 
 we "fall into manifold trials," because of that 
 mystic spiritual alchemy by which trials are 
 changed into blessings and our antagonists 
 transformed into our slaves. 
 
 Can we just now nestle a little more closely 
 into the loving purpose of God? Why are 
 antagonisms allowed to range themselves across 
 our way ? Why are there any blind streets 
 which bar our progress ? Why does not labour 
 always issue in success ? Why are " manifold 
 trials " permitted ? We may find a partial 
 response in the words of my text. They are 
 Verse 7 permitted for " f Ae froof^^ of our faith. That 
 is the purposed ministry of the sharp antagonism 
 and the cloudy day — " the jproof of your faith.^^ 
 Now, to " prove " the faith means much more 
 
CHAPTER I. 6, 7 19 
 
 than to test it. First of all, it means to reveal 
 it. To prove the faith is to prove it to others. 
 God wants to reveal and emphasise your faith, 
 and so He sends the cloud. May we not 
 say that the loveliness of the moonlight is 
 revealed and emphasised by the ministry of the 
 cloud? It is when there are a few clouds 
 about, and the moonlight transfiguring them, 
 that the glory of the moon herself is declared. 
 And it is when the cloud is in the life that 
 the radiance of our faith is proved and pro- 
 claimed. How conspicuously the calm, steady 
 faith of our glorified Queen was proved by 
 the clouds which so frequently gathered about 
 her life ! The '' manifold trials " set out in 
 grand relief that which might have remained 
 a commonplace. Light which fringes the cloud 
 is light which is beautified. Faith which gleams 
 from behind the trial is faith which is glorified. 
 It is the hard circumstance which sets in relief 
 the quality of our devotion. As I listened to 
 a thrush singing in the cold dawn of a winter's 
 morning, I thought its song seemed sweeter 
 and richer than when heard in the advanced 
 days of spring. The wintry setting emphasised 
 the quality of the strain. Perhaps if we heard 
 the nightingale in the glare of the noontide, 
 the song would not arrest us as when it pro- 
 ceeds from the depths of the night. The shades 
 
20 THE FIBST EPISTLE OF PETEIl 
 
 and loneliness add something to the sweetness. 
 *' And at midnight Paul and Silas sang." That 
 is the song which is heard by the fellow-prisoners 
 and startles them into wonder. The trial came 
 and your faith was " proved." You lost your 
 money, and men discovered your devotion. 
 Your gold, the finest of your gold, the most 
 rare and exquisite among your treasures, was 
 destroyed and perished; but in the hour of 
 your calamity your faith was proved, and men 
 bowed in spiritual wonder before the mystery 
 of the Divine. Your trial was your triumph; 
 the place of apparent defeat became the hal- 
 lowed shrine of a glorious conquest. " Now are 
 ye in grief through manifold trials," that in the 
 midst of the cloud the Lord might "prove" 
 and reveal your faith. 
 
 But "the manifold trials" do more than 
 reveal the faith. There is another ministry 
 wrapped up in this suggestive word "prove." 
 Verse 7 The trial that reveals the faith also streTigthens 
 and confirms it. The faith that is ''proved'' 
 is more richly endowed. The strong wind and 
 rain which try the tree are also the ministers 
 of its invigoration. The round of the varying 
 seasons makes the tree "well seasoned," and 
 solidifies and enriches its fibre. It is the nega- 
 tive which develops the strength of the affirma- 
 tive. It is antagonism which cultivates the 
 
CHAPTER I. 6, 7 21 
 
 wrestler. It is the trial which makes the 
 saint. The man who sustains his hold upon 
 God through one trial will find it easier to 
 confront the next trial and exploit it for 
 eternal good. And so these " manifold trials " 
 prove our faith. They reveal and they enrich 
 our resources. They strengthen and refine 
 our spiritual apprehension. They may strip 
 us of our material possessions, ^Hhe gold 
 that perisheth^^^ but they endow us with the 
 wealth of that "inheritance" which is "in- 
 corruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not 
 away." 
 
 And, finally, there is one other radiant 
 glimpse of the resplendent issues of a " proved " 
 and invigorated faith : " That the proof of your 
 faith . . . might be found unto praise and Verse 7 
 glory and honour at the revelation of Jesus 
 Christ:* 
 
 Our "proved" faith is to come to its crown 
 in a manifestation of praise and glory and 
 honour. When Jesus appears, these things are 
 to appear with Him. The trial of our faith 
 is to issue in ^^ praise J ^ And what shall be 
 the praise ? On that great day of unveiling, 
 when all things are made clear, I shall dis- 
 cover what my trials have accomplished. I shall 
 perceive that they were all the time the instru- 
 ments of a gracious ministry, strengthening 
 
22 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 me even when I thought I was being im- 
 poverished. The wonderful discovery will urge 
 my soul into song, and praise will break upon 
 my lips. " Found unto praise and glory. '' And 
 whose shall be the glory? When the Lord 
 appears, many other things will become ap- 
 parent. What I thought hard will now appear 
 as gracious. What I recoiled from as severe 
 I shall find to be merciful. What I esteemed 
 as forgetfulness will reveal itself as faith- 
 fulness. He was nearest when I thought Him 
 farthest away. He was faithful even when 
 I was faithless. At His appearing I shall 
 apprehend and appreciate my Lord. "The 
 glory of the Lord shall be revealed." " Found 
 unto praise and glory aoid honour^ And 
 whence shall flow the honour? I shall find 
 that when the Lord sent a trial, and by the 
 trial revealed my faith, many a fainting heart 
 took courage, and by the beauty of my de- 
 votion many a shy soul was secretly wooed 
 into the kingdom of God. I never knew 
 it, but at His appearing this shall also appear. 
 This discovery shall be my coronation. The 
 supreme honours of heaven are reserved for 
 those who have brought others there. "They 
 that turn many to righteousness shall shine as 
 the stars for ever and ever." And so by the 
 cloud of manifold trials God leads me into 
 
CHAPTER I. 6, 7 23 
 
 tlie spacious sovereignty of glory, praise, and 
 honour. 
 
 God moves in a mysterious way 
 
 His wonders to perform ; 
 He plants His footsteps in the sea, 
 
 And rides upon the storm. 
 
 Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take; 
 
 The clouds ye so much dread 
 Are big with mercy, and shall break 
 
 With blessings on your head. 
 
A TWOFOLD EELATIONSHIP AND ITS 
 
 FEUITS. 
 
 1 Petee i. 8, 9 
 
 Whom not having seen ye love ; on whom, though now ye see 
 Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice greatly ivith joy unspeak- 
 able and full of glory. 
 
 Verse 8 " Whom not having seen ye loveJ' We some- 
 times speak of " love at first sight." Two lives 
 are brought together, and there is a recognition 
 pregnant with far-off destinies. "Deep calleth 
 unto deep." The affinities leap into spiritual 
 wedlock. Each knows the other as life's com- 
 plement, and the hearts embrace in hallowed 
 union. It was only a look, and love was born : 
 
 Entering then, 
 Right o'er a mount of newly fallen stones, 
 The dusky-raftered, many-cobwebbed hall, 
 He found an ancient dame in dim brocade ; 
 And near her, like a blossom vermeil-white 
 That lightly breaks a faded flower sheath, 
 Moved the fair Enid all in faded silk. 
 Her daughter. In a moment thought Geraint, 
 "Here by God's rood is the one maid for me." 
 
 The fair vision came, and its gentle impression 
 awoke the sleeping love and stirred it into fer- 
 vent and vigilant life. It was " love at first sight." 
 
 24 
 
CHAPTER I. 8, 9 25 
 
 But love is not always aroused by the first 
 sight. Tlie " first sight " may not stir the heart 
 to even a languid interest. The vision may be as 
 uninfluential as a cipher. Or the " first sight " 
 may create a repulsion. It may excite my dis- 
 like. It may rather rouse the critic than wake 
 the lover. But love that remains sleeping at 
 the "first sight" may be aroused by more 
 intimate communion. The ministries of the 
 spirit may triumph where the allurements of 
 the countenance failed. Love may be born, not 
 of sight, but of fellowship. It may spring into 
 being amid the intimacies of a deepening com- 
 panionship. You remember the story of Othello 
 and Desdemona, and how their hearts were 
 drawn into affectionate communion. It was 
 not love at "first sight," but love at heart 
 sight. He told her the story of his chequered 
 life, of "battles, sieges, fortunes" he had 
 passed, of disastrous chances, of moving acci- 
 dents by flood and field. " This to hear would 
 Desdemona seriously incline." 
 
 My story being done 
 She gave me for my pains a world of sighs ; 
 She swore, in faith, 'twas strange, 'twas passing strange ; 
 'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful. 
 
 She loved me for the dangers I had passed, 
 And I loved her that she did pity them. 
 
26 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 It was the communion of spirit with spirit 
 which unsealed the springs of their affection. 
 We recognise the principle in common life. 
 A number of young people are thrown together 
 in frequent fellowship. For months, and per- 
 haps for years, their association does not pass 
 beyond the sphere of friendship. But one day 
 the fellowship of two of them opened into 
 intimacy, and the sober servant, friendship, 
 made way for the master passion, love. They 
 had seen each other's faces for years, and they 
 remained companions ; they caught a glimpse 
 of each other's hearts, and they were trans- 
 formed into lovers. So love may be the child 
 of spiritual intimacy. It may wait on know- 
 ledge. It may wake into being through the 
 ministry of a deep communion. 
 
 *'Whom not having seen ye love." Theirs 
 was not the love born of gazing upon Christ's 
 face, but the love begotten by communion with 
 His heart. Love may be born of spiritual 
 fellowship. If only we can get into intimacy 
 with the Master's spirit, love may wake into 
 being and song. It is just for this opportunity 
 of individual communion that the Master is 
 craving. He has little fear of our not fall- 
 ing in love with Him, if we will only listen 
 to His story. He wants to visit the heart 
 and whisper His evangel in the secret place. 
 
CHAPTER I. 8, 9 27 
 
 Do I debase the sublime quest wben I say- 
 He yearns to "court" the soul, to woo and 
 to win it ? " If any man will open the door, 
 I will come in and sup with him." That is 
 what He asks — an open door. He asks to be 
 allowed to visit the soul, to pay His atten- 
 tions, to declare His aims and purposes, and 
 to whisper the Gospel of His own unsearch- 
 able love. He wants to talk to us separately 
 in individual wooings. He wants us to find a 
 little time to listen to Him while He talks about 
 the Father and Sonship, and life and its re- 
 sources, and heaven and its rest and glory. 
 He wants to talk to us about the burden of 
 sin and guilt, and the exhaustion of weakness. 
 He wants to whisper something to us about 
 our newly born child and about our newly made 
 grave. He would like to come very near to 
 us and tell us what He knows about sorrow 
 and death, and the morrow which begins at the 
 shadow we fear. I say He wants to tell it all 
 to thee and to me — to thee, my brother, as 
 though there were no other soul to woo beneath 
 God's heaven. The winsome story shall wind 
 its wonderful way around Christ and Bethlehem 
 and thee, around Christ and Gethsemane and 
 thee, around Christ and Calvary and thee, 
 around Christ and heaven and thee ! He will 
 tell thee of His agonies and tears, and He will 
 
28 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 show thee the scars He received in the quest of 
 thy redemption. 
 
 Hath He marks to lead me to Him 
 
 If He be my guide 1 
 In His hands and feet are wound-prints, 
 
 And His side. 
 
 He will tell thee all His story. And the sublime 
 purpose of the communion shall be to woo 
 thee, that in His tender fellowship the springs 
 of thine own love may be unsealed and thou 
 mayest become engaged, by the bonds of an 
 eternal covenant, to the Lord of life and glory. 
 *' "We love him because he first " wooed us 
 The early love may be timid and shy, half 
 afraid of itself, and trembling in some un- 
 certainty, but it shall put on strength and 
 sweetness in the deeper and riper fellowships 
 of your wedded life. Wedded to the King, you 
 shall come to realise more and more the freedom 
 of His forgiveness, the triumph of His power, 
 the sweet pressure of His presence, the alluring 
 glory of the living hope, and with this enrich- 
 ment of your intimacies your heart will become 
 possessed by a more intense and fervent affection 
 for Him " whom not having seen ye love." 
 
 '' On ivhom . . . believingJ^ Here is a second ex- 
 pression of the Christian's relationship to Christ. 
 "Oti whom . . . believing." The figure is sug- 
 gestive of a leaning posture, an attitude of 
 
CHAPTER I. 8, 9 29 
 
 dependence, a confident resting of one's weight 
 upon the Christ we love. It is the acceptance 
 of His reasonings as sound. It is the assumption 
 that His judgments are dependable. It is the 
 usage of His weapons as adequate for our strife. 
 It is the assurance that His promises are the ex- 
 pression of spiHtual laws, and that there is no 
 more caprice in their ministry than there is in 
 the operation of laws in the physical world. 
 ''On Him believing." But it is more than 
 assent to a conclusion, more than a confidence 
 m His word. It is repose upon a person, a 
 resting upon a presence, a trusting in a com- 
 panionship. If the Christian evangel is worth 
 anything at all it means this— that the Christ 
 of God, the '' Lover of the soul," is by the loved 
 one's side in inseparable and all-sufficient fellow- 
 Bhip. In the moment of extraordinary crisis 
 and strain, " on " Him I can depend for im- 
 mediate equipment. In the long-drawn-out day 
 of wearying and monotonous commonplace, "on " 
 Him I can lean for unfailing supplies. In the 
 dark and cloudy day, and amid the gathering 
 terrors of the advancing night, " on " Him I 
 can depend for inspiring light and life. That is 
 the very music of the Christian evangel. The 
 words which indicate the Master's presence 
 suggest the all-significant closeness of His Spirit. 
 " Companion ! " " Comforter ! " ^' Fellowship ! "* 
 
30 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 " Partaker ! " The phraseology varies ; the sig- 
 nificance is one. The Lord is imminent and 
 immediate : '' Closer is He than breathing, and 
 nearer than hands and feet " ; upon Him we 
 may trustfully rest our weight in all the 
 changing circumstances of our ever-changing 
 way. 
 Verse 8 " Whom not having seen ye love ; on whom , . . 
 believing^ ye rejoice.^^ Is there anything surprising 
 in the issue ? Won by His love, wedded to the 
 Lord, confident in His fellowship — is it any 
 wonder that out of such wealthy conditions 
 there should a^rise a fountain of joy ? Surely 
 we have the very ingredients of spiritual de- 
 light. If we take spiritual affection — "whom 
 not having seen ye love " — and combine it with 
 spiritual confidence — "on whom . . . believing" 
 — I do not see how we can escape the crown of 
 rejoicing. If either of the elements be anni- 
 hilated, our joy is destroyed. All the bird-music 
 that rings through the countryside at the dawn 
 can be hushed by the appearance of the hawk. 
 Let your little child come into a presence in 
 whom she has not gained confidence, and the 
 light of joy departs, and her face becomes like 
 a blown-out lamp. It is the co-operative 
 ministry of love and confidence which awakes 
 the genius of joy. It is the love and con- 
 fidence of wedded life which make the clear, 
 
CHAPTER I. 8, 9 31 
 
 calm joy of tlie hurrying years. The thought 
 of the loved one is a baptism of light. A letter 
 from the loved one redeems any day from 
 commonplace. The presence of the loved one 
 is a full and perpetual feast. It is not other- 
 wise in the highest relationships. If the soul 
 and the Lord are lovers, and there is a mutual 
 confidence, the soul will drink at the river of 
 rare and exquisite delights. To think of Him 
 will set the bells a-ringing. 
 
 Jesus, the very thought of Thee 
 With sweetness fills my breast. 
 
 How unlike that other soul of whom we read in 
 the Sacred Word, " I remembered God, and was 
 troubled." A thought that rang an alarm-bell. 
 
 Jesus, the very thought of Thee 
 With sweetness fills my breast. 
 
 A remembrance that rang anew the wedding- 
 bells. ** Whom not having seen ye love." Then 
 it is daytime in the soul. " On whom . . . 
 believing." Then there is no cloud over the 
 communion. Daytime and no cloud ! Then 
 there must be sunshine in the soul. " Ye rejoice 
 greatly with joy unspeakable and fuU of glory." 
 
 " With joy unspeakable^ All the deepest and verse 
 richest things are unspeakable. A mother's 
 love ! Who has discovered a symbol by which 
 to express it? It is unspeakable, A profound 
 
^ 32 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 grief ! Where is tlie speech in which it can 
 be enshrined? 
 
 In words like weeds I'll wrap me o'er, 
 Like coarsest clothes against the cold ; 
 But that large grief which these enfold 
 
 Is given in outline and no more. 
 
 It is unspeakable. A bleeding sympathy ! Has 
 it not just to remain dumb ? We stand or sit 
 with interlocked hands, bereft of all adequate 
 expression ! It is unspeakable. A spiritual 
 joy ! How shall we tell it ? Where is the mould 
 of speech which can catch and hold the ethereal 
 presence ? It is unspeakable. 
 
 But what to those who find ? Ah ! this 
 
 Nor tongue nor pen can show: 
 The love of Jesus, what it is 
 
 None but His loved ones know. 
 
 Verse 8 " With joy unspeakable smdfull of glory. ^^ It is 
 a joy which is glorious and glorifying. There 
 are joys that weaken and impair the soul. The 
 happiness of the world is a corroding atmosphere 
 that blunts and destroys the fine perception and 
 discernments of the life. But "joy in the 
 Lord" is light which glorifies life. It is like 
 sunshine on the landscape. It adds warmth, 
 and beauty, and tenderness, and grace. This 
 joy is never productive of weakness ; it is 
 synonymous with power. " The joy of the Lord 
 is your strength." 
 
CHAPTER I. 8, 9 33 
 
 ^^ Receiving the end of your faith^ even the Yevsed 
 salvation of your soulsJ' Wedded to the Lord 
 in consecrated love, leaning upon Him in con- 
 fident dependence, rejoicing in joy unspeak- 
 able — surely this will mean a ripening personality 
 maturing day by day, shedding not only its 
 disease but also its impotence. We " receive " 
 the salvation of our souls. Moment by moment 
 we "receive" it. Our salvation is a gradual 
 but assured ascension into the strength and 
 beauty of the King. We are in the currents 
 of the everlasting life. Moment by moment we 
 receive the end of our faith. Each moment 
 deposits its own contribution to my spiritual 
 heritage. Moment by moment I enter more 
 deeply into my inheritance in Christ, into " the 
 unsearchable riches of grace." 
 
BEING FASHIONED 
 
 1 Petee i. 13-16 
 
 Wherefore girding up the loins of your mind, he sober and 
 
 set your hope perfectly on the grace that is being brought 
 unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ ; as children 
 of obedience, not fashioning yourselves according to your 
 former lusts in the time of your ignorance : but like as He 
 which called you is holy, be ye yourselves also holy in all 
 manner of living ; because it is written, Ye shall be holy ; 
 for I am holy. 
 
 *' Wherefore I " The word gathers up all the 
 wealthy results of the previous reasonings. 
 The present appeal is based on the introductory 
 evangel. The inspiration of tasks is found in 
 the recesses of profound truths. Spiritual 
 impulse is created by the momentum of super- 
 lative facts. The dynamic of duty is born in 
 the heart of the Gospel. " Wherefore," says 
 the apostle, if these be your prospects and 
 dynamics, if you have been *' begotten again 
 into a living hope," if you are heirs to 
 "an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled," 
 if even apparent hostilities may be converted 
 
 8i 
 
CHAPTER I. 13-16 35 
 
 into wealthy helpmeets, and "manifold trials" 
 into the ministers of salvation, " girding np the 
 loins of your mind, be sober and set ycur 
 hope perfectly on the grace that is being 
 brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus 
 Christ." 
 
 The " wherefore " is thus suggestive of the 
 bases of this urgent and practical appeal. Our 
 life is purposed to shine in Divine dignity. 
 Our prospects are glorious. Our resources are 
 abounding. We should therefore lay aside 
 our laxity. Life should not be spent in idle 
 reverie. Our movement should not be a careless 
 sauntering. Our rest should not be a thought- 
 less lounging. Life should be characterised by 
 clear sight, definite thought, eager purpose, and 
 decided ends. 
 
 " Wherefore girding tip the loins of your mind.'' Verse 13 
 The figure of the passage is taken from the 
 flowing garments of the Oriental dress. The 
 flapping robes catch the wind and wrap them- 
 selves about, the legs, and become serious 
 hindrances to easy and progressive movement. 
 The wearer therefore lays hold of the en- 
 tangling garments and tucks them into a girdle, 
 which discharges the ministry of a belt. He 
 gathers together the disorderly robes and binds 
 them into a compact and serviceable vesture. 
 Now, the apostle declares that a similar dis- 
 
36 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 order may prevail in the realm of thought and 
 affection. Our life may be characterised by 
 mental slovenliness. Our thoughts may trail in 
 loose disorder. We may give little or no care 
 to the beauty and firmness of the mind. How 
 much loose thinking there is concerning the 
 profoundest and most vital concerns of our 
 life ! And the loose thinking does not end with 
 itself. A loose garment may trip a man up 
 and cause him to stumble. Loose thinking is 
 equally perilous, and may lead to moral 
 entanglement and perdition. Loose thinking 
 is creative of loose living ; mental slovenliness 
 issues in moral disorder. Therefore " gird up 
 the loins of your mind." Put some strenuous- 
 ness into your thinking. Do not let your 
 thought drift along on the stream of reverie. 
 Steer your thought and strongly guide it into 
 wealthy havens. How do I think about God ? 
 Loosely and unworthily, or with firm and 
 fruitful conception ? " God is gi^eat" and greatly 
 to be thought about ; and if I think about Him 
 loosely my sonship will be a stumbling and an 
 offence. How do I think about grace ? Is my 
 thinking sluggish and unworthy, and so do I 
 " despise the riches of his goodness " ? How 
 do I think about my spiritual call and prospects 
 and destiny ? Am I stumbling over my own 
 thinking ? Are my own garments my most 
 
CHAPTER I. 13-16 37 
 
 immediate snares ? Is my spiritual confusion 
 the result of my mental indolence? "My 
 people do not consider." In my want of strong 
 and strenuous thinking may be found some 
 explanation of my moral and spiritual 
 disasters. 
 
 As it is with the element of thought, so it is 
 with the power of affection ; for perhaps in the 
 spiritual term " mind " both thought and 
 affection are included. We speak of " wander- 
 ing affections," and truly affection may become 
 an appalling vagrant. Affection is easily 
 allured, easily entangled, easily snared by the 
 worldly glitter which gleams by the side of 
 the common way. Or, if we recur to the 
 apostle's figure, our loose affections, like flowing 
 garments that are blown about by the wind, 
 entangle our faculties and make havoc of our 
 moral and spiritual progress. We must "gird 
 up the loins " of our affection. It will not be 
 child's play, but he who wants a religion of 
 child's play must not seek the companionship 
 of Christ. The Master spake of cutting off the 
 right hand and plucking out the right eye, and 
 the bleeding figure has reference to the sever- 
 ing of relationships and the disentangling of 
 well-established affections. To free a flowing 
 garment which has been caught in a thorn 
 hedge may necessitate rents, and to disentangle 
 
38 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 an unworthy affection may necessitate pain, 
 but even at the cost of rent and pain the 
 deliverance must be effected. We must gird 
 up the loins of our trailing affections. "We 
 must not hold them so cheaply. We must not 
 permit them to sweep the broad road and 
 to expose themselves to the entanglement of 
 every obtruding thorn. We must " set " our 
 " affections upon things above," and for that 
 sublime purpose we must gather them together 
 in strenuous concentration. This exhortation 
 is therefore an appeal for collectedness both of 
 thought and of feeling. It is a warning against 
 mental and affectional looseness, and with 
 loving urgency the apostle pleads with his 
 readers to pull themselves together, to gird up 
 their loins, and with full energy of thought and 
 feeling devote themselves to the worship and 
 service of God. 
 Verse 13 '•'' Be sobeT^ This is more than an injunction 
 against intemperance in diet. Intemperance is 
 productive of stupor. It is the enemy of a 
 refined sensitiveness. It is creative of heaviness 
 and sleep. And it is this closing of the senses, 
 by whatever agency it may be induced, against 
 which the apostle raises his voice in clamant 
 warning. " Be sober." Be on your guard 
 against everything which is creative of heavi- 
 ness, and which may put your senses into a 
 
CHAPTEE I. 13-16 39 
 
 perilous sleep. At all costs keep awake and 
 vigilant ! Just as excessive drinking drugs the 
 flesh and sinks the body into a heavy sleep, 
 so there are other conditions which create a 
 similar stupor in the soul and by which the 
 moral and spiritual senses are burdened and 
 benumbed. There are opiates and narcotics 
 which may make us spiritually drunk, and 
 render us unconscious of the Divine voices that 
 peal from the heights. " Not a few sleep." 
 The sleep is induced by opiates. There is the 
 opiate of pleasure ; there is the opiate of 
 prosperity; there is the opiate of self-satisfac- 
 tion ; there is the depressing drug of disap- 
 pointment. Against all these we are to be 
 on our guard. "Be sober," and amid all the 
 narcotising atmospheres of enchanted grounds 
 preserve a wakeful spirit by a ceaseless fellow- 
 ship with God. 
 
 " And set your hope jperfectly on the grace that Verse 13 
 is being brought unto you in the revelation of Jesus 
 GhristJ^ Here is the spiritual attitude by which 
 the girded and sober life may be attained. My 
 resources are to be found in the grace that is 
 brought unto me in Christ. In Christ is my 
 reservoir of power. The grace of the Lord 
 Jesus is my dynamic. The resource will never 
 fail me. The supply is never exhausted. It 
 is "being brought" unto me continually — a 
 
40 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 "river of water of life." Grace is just a full 
 river of heavenly favour, carrying all need- 
 ful equipment and rich with the potencies of 
 eternal life. Upon this grace I am to find the 
 basis of my hope. I am to " set my hope 
 perfectly " upon this as the all-sufficient energy 
 for lifting me to the unveiled heights and 
 enabling me to dwell there in undisturbed 
 serenity. I am to release my thought from 
 hindering entanglements, and I am to deliver 
 my afiection from enslaving fellowships, and I 
 am to preserve a vigilant sobriety amid all the 
 sleep-inducing atmospheres of the world; and 
 for the accomplishment of this glorious emanci- 
 pation I am bidden to " set my hope perfectly 
 on the grace that is being brought unto me at 
 the revelation of Jesus Christ." 
 
 The apostle now probes more deeply into 
 the mode of godly living, and unveils a httle 
 more clearly the principle by which the holy 
 life is fashioned. Life is formed by conformity. 
 There is always a something towards which we 
 tend and approximate, and " we take hue from 
 that to which we cling." There is always a 
 something " according to " which we are being 
 shaped. " According to Thy word," " according 
 to this world," " according to the former lusts." 
 We are for ever coming into accord with some- 
 thing, and that something determines the fashion 
 
CHAPTER I. 13-16 41 
 
 of our lives. Now, this principle of " forming 
 by conforming" is proclaimed by the apostle 
 in the succeeding words of this great passage ; 
 and as ^''children of obedience^'' we are called 
 to a manner of life which at once demands 
 a stern nonconformity and a strong and fervent 
 conformity. 
 
 " Not fashioning yourselves according to your verse 14 
 former lusts in the time of your ignorance^ " Not 
 fashioning . . . according to lusts." That con- 
 formity must be broken. That " accordance " 
 must be destroyed. Our lusts must not be our 
 formatives, giving shape and fashion to our 
 lives. If our lust raise its feverish and im- 
 perious demand, we must be stern and relentless 
 nonconformists. Are we imagining that the 
 imperiousness of lust moves in very circum- 
 scribed ways, and that perhaps we escape from 
 its fierce and burning tyranny ? The New 
 Testament conception of lust covers a very 
 spacious area, and includes elements to which 
 perhaps we should not give the appalling name. 
 You may have the same element in different 
 guises, now appearing as a solid, and now as 
 a liquid, and now as a gas. And you may 
 have the same essential vice in some tangible 
 loathsomeness and in some hidden and im- 
 palpable temper. The Master told us that we 
 have the same essential thing in anger and 
 
42 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 in murder, only one is gross and solid, while 
 the other is gaseous and comparatively refined. 
 But the trouble is that, when vice is gaseous, 
 we conceive it as proportionately harmless ; when 
 it solidifies into open crime, it ensures our re- 
 probation. Now, when the Master speaks of 
 lust, He speaks of it in its gaseous state, as 
 a condition of thought, as a state of temper, 
 as a mode of spirit ; and in this interpretation 
 **lust" is just the essentially carnal, the itching 
 after the world, the feverish desire for selfish 
 pleasure, to the utter ignoring of the supremacy 
 of the truth. 
 
 In many lives this lust is the determining 
 and formative force ; everything is made to 
 bow to it ; all the affairs of life are fashioned 
 by it. It occupies the throne and moulds all 
 life's concerns into its own accord. The apostle 
 vehemently counsels his readers against this 
 conformity. He pleads that the children of 
 liberty should not retain the governing powers 
 of their servitude. The night should not pro- 
 vide the patterns for the day. The season of 
 " ignorance " should not create the ruling 
 powers for the season of knowledge and revela- 
 tion. He urges them to revolt against the old 
 forces, to become spiritual nonconformists, not 
 fashioning themselves after their former lusts. 
 Vcive 15 t' But like as He which called you is holy, be 
 
CHAPTER I. 13-16 43 
 
 ye yourselves also holy in all manner of living.^^ 
 The holy God is to be the formative force in 
 our life, and to Him are we to be devoted in 
 close and intimate conformity. " As He which 
 called you." The call is a Divine pledge. The 
 acceptance of the call implies a human obliga- 
 tion. There is the pledge on the side of God, 
 and the obligation on the side of man. The 
 call, given and received, creates an intimate 
 fellowship. The One who calls is holy, and 
 by the mighty ministry of the Spirit he who 
 shares the fellowship is transformed into the 
 same holiness. All fellowship with God is pro- 
 ductive of spiritual likeness. If we gaze into 
 His face, we shall be illumined with the light 
 of His countenance. " Beholding as in a mirror 
 the glory of the Lord, we are transformed 
 into the same image." AVe absorb the glory 
 of the Lord. We become transfigured by it. 
 Let us mark the breadth of the transform- 
 ing process. We are to be holy *' in all 
 manner of living." The pervasive power of the 
 Spirit is to influence every walk of life and 
 every part of the walk. The transfiguring 
 energy is to inhabit even trifles, and the 
 commonplaces of life are to be illumined by 
 the indwelling of the eternal light. We shall 
 grow in grace, putting on more and more of the 
 beauty of Him in whose fellowship we dwell. 
 
44 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 Verse 16 " Because it is written, Ye shall he holy ; for 1 
 am holyT That is more than an imperative ; 
 it is an evangel. It is a command which en- 
 shrines a promise. Because God is holy we 
 have the promise of holiness. Therefore we 
 may sing with the psalmist, in words which 
 at the first hearing may appear strange, " "We 
 give thanks at the remembrance of His holi- 
 ness." Wherefore, with this glorious provision 
 for our life, with resources more than adequate 
 for our tasks, with power that even surpasses 
 the grandeur of our calling, let us "gird up 
 the loins of our mind, be sober, and set our 
 hope perfectly on the grace that is being 
 brought unto us at the revelation of Jesus 
 Christ." 
 
THE HOLINESS OF THE FATHER 
 
 1 Peter i. 17-21 
 
 And if ye call on Him as Father, who without respect 
 of persons jitdgeth according to each marCs work, pass the 
 time of your sojourning in fear : knowing that ye were 
 redeemed, not with corru2ytihle things, with silver or gold, 
 from your vain manner of life handed down from your 
 fathers; hut with precious blood, as of a lamb withou 
 blemish and without spot, even the blood of Christ : who 
 was foreknown indeed before the foundation of the world, 
 but was m/xnifested at the end of the times for your sake, 
 who through Him are believers in God, which raised Him 
 from the dead, and gave Him glory ; so that your faith 
 and hope might be in God, 
 
 *' If ye call on Him as Father^ who . . , judgeih.^^ Verse 17 
 That is an extraordinary conjunction of terms. 
 It is a daring and surprising companion- 
 ship to associate, in immediate union, the 
 function of the judge with the personality of 
 Father. I had anticipated that the term 
 " Father '^ would have suggested quite other 
 relationships, and would have emphasised 
 functions of an altogether different type. I did 
 not anticipate the intimate wedlock of " Father '' 
 and "judge." I had thought that the glad 
 
 45 
 
46 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 succession would have proceeded somewhat on 
 this wise : '' If ye call on Him as Father, who 
 lovethl'' "If ye call on Him as Father, who 
 pitieth ! " '' If ye call on Him as Father, who 
 forgiveth ! " I had interpreted the word " father " 
 as being suggestive of the free and kindly 
 intimacies of the fireside ; but here it stands 
 indicative of the august prerogatives of a throne. 
 "If ye call on Him as Father, who judgeth." 
 The element which I had forgotten is made 
 conspicuous and primary, and determines the 
 shape and colour of man's relationship to God. 
 " If ye call on Him as Father, who judgeth.'^ 
 Then the element of holy sovereignty must be 
 a cardinal content in our conception of the 
 Fatherhood of God. What does the term 
 " Father " immediately suggest to me ? Good 
 nature or holiness ; laxity or righteousness ; a 
 hearthstone or a great white throne ? The 
 primary element in my conception will deter- 
 mine the quality of my religious life. If the 
 holiness of Fatherhood be minimised or obscured, 
 every other attribute will be impoverished. 
 Denude your conception of holiness, and it is 
 like withdrawing the ozone from the invigora- 
 ting air, or detracting the freshening salt from 
 the healthy sea. Suppress or ignore the element 
 of holiness, and think of the Father as affection- 
 ate, and the love that you attribute to Him 
 
CHAPTER I. 17-21 47 
 
 will be only as a close and enervating air. 
 Love without holiness is deoxygenated, and its 
 ministry is that of an opiate or narcotic. Pity 
 without holiness is a bloodless sentiment desti- 
 tute of all healing efficiency. Forgiveness 
 without holiness is the granting of a cheap and 
 superficial excuse, in which there is nothing of 
 the saving strength of sacrifice. Begin with 
 pity or forgiveness, or forbearance or gentleness, 
 and you have dispositions without dynamics, 
 poor limp things, which afford no resource for 
 the upUfting and salvation of the race. But 
 begin with holiness, and you put a dynamic into 
 every disposition which makes it an engine 
 of spiritual health. Forgiveness with holiness 
 behind it is a medicated sentiment, fraught with 
 healing and bracing ministry. Gentleness with 
 holiness behind it touches the aches and sores 
 of the world with the firm and delicate hand 
 of a discerning and experienced nurse. Exalt 
 the element of holiness, and you enrich your 
 entire conception of the Fatherhood of God. 
 The " river of water of life " flows " out of the 
 throne." " The Father who judgeth." " Our 
 Father, halloived be Thy name." 
 
 And now the apostle proceeds to tell us how 
 his conception of the holiness of God is fostered 
 and enriched. "Wherever he turns it is God's 
 holiness, and not God's pity, which smites and 
 
48 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 arrests his attention. He is never permitted to 
 become irreverent, for lie is never out of sight 
 of "the great white throne." He moves in 
 fruitful wonder, ever contemplating the glory 
 of the burning holiness of God. If he meditates 
 upon the character of the Father's judgments, 
 it is their holiness by which he is possessed. 
 If he moves with breathless steps amid the 
 mysteries of redemption, even beneath the 
 blackness of the cross he discovers the white- 
 ness of the throne. If he dwells upon the 
 purposes of the Divine yearning, it is the holi- 
 ness of the Father's ambition for His children 
 which holds him entranced. The holiness of 
 the Father emerges everywhere. It is expressed 
 and placarded in all His doings. Everywhere 
 could the apostle take upon his lips the words 
 of another wondering spirit who gazed and 
 worshipped in a far-off day : "I saw the Lord, 
 high and lifted up! Holy, holy, holy is the 
 Lord." 
 
 The Father^ ivho without respect of persons 
 judgeth according to each man's ivork" The 
 apostle finds the holiness of the Father ex- 
 pressed in the character of His judgments. 
 The elements which so commonly shape the 
 judgments of men do not count in the judg- 
 ments of God. He judgeth ''without respect 
 of persons." Fine feathers do not count as 
 
# 
 
 CHAPTER I. 17-21 49 
 
 refinement. Faces may be masks. Tlie " per- 
 sona " may be an actor. The Father pays no 
 respect to the mere show of things. All masks 
 become transparent. All veils become trans- 
 lucent. The material show, with all ephemeral 
 titles, and nobilities, and dignities, and degrees, 
 are not accepted as evidence, but are put down, 
 and only spiritual characteristics and moral 
 essentials are permitted as testimony of personal 
 worth. *' The Father, without respect of 
 persons, judgeth according to each man's luorky Verse 17 
 And what is the bulk and quality of my luork ? 
 If the Father judge me by my output in the 
 shape of finished and realised achievement, 
 then I shrink from the wretched unveiling ! I 
 have laboured for the salvation of men ; how 
 will He judge my "work"? Will He tabulate 
 the results ? Will He count my converts ? Is 
 that how James Gilmour will be judged, who 
 after long years of labour in Mongolia could 
 not record a single regenerated soul ? If 
 " work " means finished results, how few of us 
 wiU be crowned ! " This is the work, that ye 
 believe." That is the basis of judgment. How 
 much of holy energy is expressed in our 
 relationship to God ? What is the strength of 
 our fellowship with the Divine? That is the 
 primal energy of character, and that is the 
 criterion of the Divine judgment. Out of that 
 
50 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 energy of belief there is bom the magnificent 
 force which expresses itself in prolonged labours 
 in Mongolia, in fearless pioneering in New 
 Guinea, in unromantic, educational ministry in 
 India, in plucky, unyielding struggle with great 
 evils in England, in tiring, unapplauded toil 
 among the poor, in dry and heart-breaking 
 service among the rich, in steady, persistent 
 battle with " the world, the flesh, and the devil." 
 All these toils are the offspring of belief. In 
 the energy of belief they find their life and the 
 secret of their dauntless perseverance. And so 
 James Gilmour will not be judged by his 
 " results," but by his " bloody sweat." He will 
 be judged, and so shall we all, by the suppli- 
 cating wrestle of the heart, by the quality of 
 our aspiration, by the depth and fervour of our 
 belief. In this type and character of judgment 
 the apostle sees the mark of the holiness of 
 God. " I saw the dead, small and great, stand 
 before God," and the Father judged them 
 " according to each man's work." " I remember 
 thy work of faiths 
 
 The apostle now turns to another expression 
 of the holiness of the Father, and he finds it 
 in the character of our redemption. " Knowing 
 Verses that," reflecting that, " ye were redeemed^ not with 
 corruptible things . . . hut with 'precious bloody as 
 of a lamb without blemish and without spot^ even 
 
 18. 19 
 
CHAPTER I. 17-21 51 
 
 the blood of Christy Now, link to this a previous 
 word which forms a vital part of the apostle's 
 reasoning. "I am holy." He immediately 
 unites the conception of holiness with the 
 ministry of redemption. To keep that holiness 
 in mind I am to reflect upon the character of 
 redemption. I am to gaze into the mysterious 
 depths of redemption, and I shall behold the 
 holiness of my Father. Now, that is not our 
 common inclination. We look into redemption 
 for mercy, forgiveness, condescension, love. 
 We look for the genial flame of aflection ; have 
 we been blind to the dazzling blaze of holiness? 
 We have felt the warm, yearning intimacy of 
 love, inclining towards the sinner; have we 
 felt the fierce, burning heat where holiness 
 touches sin ? 
 
 Eedemption is more than the search of 
 Father for child ; it is a tremendous wrestle of 
 holiness with sin. Have we felt only the 
 tenderness of the search, and partially over- 
 looked the terribleness of the conflict ? The 
 fear is that we may feel the geniality of the one 
 without experiencing the consuming heat of 
 the other. I proclaim it as a modern peril. 
 We do not open our eyes to the holiness that 
 battles in our redemption, and so we gain only 
 an enervated conception of redemptive love. 
 Is not this a characteristic of many of the 
 
52 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 popular hymns wMcli gather round about the 
 facts of redemption ? They are sweet, senti- 
 mental, almost gushing ; the light, lilting songs 
 of a thoughtless courtship : deep in their depths 
 I discern no sense of bloody conflict, nor do I 
 taste any tang of the bitter cup which made 
 our Saviour shrink. And so, because we do not 
 discern the majestic crusade of holiness, we do 
 not realise the enormity of sin. If we look into 
 the mystery of redemption, and do not see the 
 august holiness of God, we can never see the 
 blackness of the sovereignty of sin. Dim your 
 sense of holiness, and you lighten the colour of 
 sin. Now see what follows. Obscure the holi- 
 ness and you relieve the blackness of sin. 
 Relieve the blackness of sin and jou impoverish 
 the glory of redemption. The more we lighten 
 sin the more we uncrown our Redeemer. If 
 sin be a light thing, the Redeemer was super- 
 fluous. And so, with holiness hidden and sin 
 relieved, we come to hold a cheap redemption, 
 and it is against the conception of a cheap 
 redemption that the apostle raises an eager and 
 urgent warning — " There was nothing cheap 
 about your redemption. It was not a light 
 ministry which cost a mere trifle. Ye were 
 redeemed, not with corruptible things, as silver 
 and gold, but with precious blood, even the 
 blood of Christ." Reason from the cost of 
 
CHAPTER I. 17-21 63 
 
 redemption to the nature of the conflict; 
 reason from the nature of the conflict to the 
 black enormity of sin ; reason from the enormity 
 of sin to the glory of holiness ! A lax God 
 could have given us licence and so redeemed us 
 cheaply ! A cheap redemption might have 
 made us feel easy ; it would never have made 
 us good. A cheap forgiveness would only have 
 confirmed the sin it forgave. If we are to see 
 sin we must behold holiness, unveiled for us as 
 in a " lamb tvithout blemish and without spot^ verse 19 
 And so in the sacrifice of Christ, the apostle 
 discerns something of the holiness of the 
 Father, and thus apprehends the unspeakable 
 antagonism of holiness and sin. To him redemp- 
 tion is more than a search ; it "is a confiict. It 
 is more than a tender yearning ; it is the mighty 
 bearing of an appalling load. Between the 
 Incarnation, when Christ wa^s manifested^ and the 
 Resurrection, when God raised Him. from, the dead, 
 the powers of holiness and sin met face to face 
 in mighty combat, and in the appalling darkness 
 of Gethsemane and Calvary sin was overthrown 
 and holiness was glorified. "When I move amid 
 the mysteries of redemption, I never want to 
 become deaf to my Saviour's words, "If it be 
 possible, let this cup pass from Me." I never 
 want His cry to go out of my life, " My God, 
 My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me ? " So 
 
54 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 long as that cry sounds througli the rooms of 
 my life I can never have a cheap Redeemer, 
 and I shall be kept from the enervating in- 
 fluence of a cheap redemption. In redemption 
 I behold an unspeakable conflict which keeps 
 me ever in mind of the holiness of the Father- 
 hood of God. In my conception of redemption 
 there shall be " no curse," nothing withering 
 and destructive, for 'Hhe throne of God and 
 the Lamb shall be in it." In the sacrifice of 
 love I shall behold the holiness of God. 
 
 Out of this large conception of a holy Father- 
 hood there will arise a worthy conception of 
 sonship. If God be holy, expressing His 
 holiness in all His dealings, and "if ye call on 
 Him as Father," what manner of children ought 
 ye to be ? If I call the holy God " my Father," 
 the assumption of kinship implies obligation to 
 holiness. If I say " Father," I may not ignore 
 holiness. " If God were your father," ye would 
 bear His likeness. " Ye shall be holy ; for I am 
 holy." If then ye call on Him as "Father," 
 put yourselves in the way of appropriating His 
 glory, and of becoming radiant with the beauty 
 Verse 17 of His holiness : " pass the time of your sojourn- 
 ing in fear^ There is no suggestion in the 
 counsel of any enslaving timidity. We are not 
 to cringe like slaves, or to move as though we 
 expected that at any moment an abyss might 
 
CHAPTER I. 17-21 55 
 
 open at our feet. The Christian's walk is a fine 
 swinging step, born of hope and happy con- 
 fidence. To " pass the time in fear " is not to 
 move in paralysing dread. Nor is it to be the 
 victim of a paralysing particularity which con- 
 verts every trifle into a thorn, and makes the 
 way of life a via dolorosa of countless 
 irritations. The Christian is neither a faddist 
 nor a slave. To " pass the time in fear " is just 
 to be fearful of sleep, to watch against indiffer- 
 ence, to be alert against an insidious thought- 
 lessness, to be spiritually awake and to miss no 
 chance of heightening the purity of our souls 
 by all the ministries of holy fellowships, and by 
 a ready obedience to the Master's will. " If ye 
 call on Him as Father," let the majestic claim 
 inspire you to a spacious ambition : " pass 
 your time "in a fervent aspiration after His 
 likeness, " perfecting holiness in the fear of the 
 Lord." 
 
THE CREATION OF CULTUEE AND 
 AFFECTION 
 
 1 Petek i. 22-25 
 
 Seeing ye have purified your souls in your obedience to 
 the truth unto unfeigned love of the brethren^ love one another 
 from a clean heart fervently : having been begotten again, 
 not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, through the word 
 of God, which liveth and abideth. For, All flesh is as grass, 
 and all the glory thereof as the flower of grass. The grass 
 withereth, and the flower folleth : but the word of the Lord 
 abideth for ever. 
 
 In the very heart of this passage there lies a 
 fair and exquisite flower — the flower of an in- 
 tense and fervent affection. Its surroundings 
 reveal to us the means of its production. The 
 earlier clauses of the passage describe the mode 
 of its growth ; the later clauses describe the 
 cause of its growth. The first part is descriptive 
 of the rootage and the preliminary life of the 
 flower of love; the second part proclaims the 
 all-enswathing atmosphere in which growth is 
 rendered possible and sure. On the one hand, 
 there are revealed to us the successive and pro- 
 gressive stages of spiritual culture ; on the other 
 hand, we are introduced to the ail-pervading 
 
 66 
 
CHAPTER I. 22-25 57 
 
 power which determines their evolution. The 
 earlier part centres round about " obedience " ; 
 the latter part gathers round about " the word 
 of God." The first half emphasises the human ; 
 the second half emphasises the Divine. The 
 human and the Divine combine and co-operate, 
 and in their mingled ministry create the sweet 
 and unpolluted flower of love. Verse 22 
 
 " Love one another from a clean heart fervently. ^^ 
 How can I grow this sweet, white flower of 
 love ? Its creation is not the immediate result 
 of volition ; it is the issue of a process. We 
 cannot command it ; we can grow it. It is not 
 an " alpha " but an " omega," the " amen " in a 
 spiritual succession. If I want the flower, I 
 must begin at the root. If I want the love, I 
 must begin with obedience. The first stage 
 towards a fervent affection is " obedience to the 
 truth.^^ If a soul yearns to be crowned and 
 beautified by the grace of a delicate love, it 
 must put itself in the posture of " obedience to 
 the truth." Ay, but what is this truth to which 
 we are to pay obeisance ? Just as I penned 
 the question, the sun, which had been concealed 
 behind a cloud, broke from its hiding, and a 
 broad, wealthy tide of light flowed over the 
 garden, and revealed the young leaves in re- 
 splendent glory. The word " tree " obtains a 
 new significance when you see the branches 
 
68 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 swaying in the golden light. It is even so 
 with the familiar word " truth." To one man 
 the word is suggestive of a dim, dull, cloudy 
 quantity, having little or nothing of arresting 
 radiance or beauty. To another man "truth" 
 is a gloriously unclouded light, suggesting the 
 hallowed beauty of the eternal God. What do 
 we mean by the term "hill"? That depends 
 upon where we have lived. The word "hill" 
 has one significance at Snowdon, another at 
 Ben Nevis, another at Mont Blanc, and another 
 amid the gigantic heights of Northern India. 
 "What do we mean by " the truth " ? Where 
 have we lived f The apostle has not used the 
 word " truth " before. He seems to have kept 
 it in abeyance until by some preliminary thought 
 he has prepared our minds to give it adequate 
 content. He has been leading us through a 
 pilgrimage of contemplation, and at the end 
 of the journey he utters the word " truth," and 
 if we would enter into his conception we must 
 pack the word with the experiences of the 
 previous way. We have been peering into 
 the Fatherhood of God. The apostle has been 
 pointing out to us elements which we were 
 inclined to forget. We looked into the Father- 
 hood for sweetness ; He pointed out whiteness. 
 We looked for gentleness; He pointed out 
 holiness. We looked for tender yearnings towards 
 
CHAPTER I. 22-25 59 
 
 the sinner ; He would not permit us to overlook 
 the Divine hostility to sin. Wherever the 
 apostle turns in the contemplation of the Father- 
 hood, it is the "whiteness" that arrests him. 
 He looks into the Father's judgments, and he 
 beholds the whiteness of holiness. He glances 
 behind the veil into the mysteries of redemption, 
 and even amid the sacrifices of love he beholds 
 the glory of " the great white throne." "Wher- 
 ever he turns his wondering gaze, it is the 
 perception of a character " without blemish and 
 without spot " that brings him to his knees. 
 "When, therefore, we emerge from the solemn 
 sight-seeing, as we do in the twenty-second 
 verse, and I hear the apostle use the word 
 "truth," I know that he inserts into the word 
 the content of superlative whiteness, and that 
 while he uses it he bows before the holiness of 
 the Fatherhood of God. Here, then, we must 
 begin the culture of affection. We must begin 
 with the contemplation of whitenesss, with a 
 steady, steadfast gazing upon the holiness of 
 the Fatherhood of God. We must let holiness 
 tower in our conception of God, as the dazzling 
 snow abides on the lifted heights of the Alps. 
 The "truth" is the unveiled face of the Holy 
 Father. The first step in the creation of pure 
 affection is the contemplation of a Holy God. 
 The apostle uses a very graphic word to 
 
60 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 further describe the healthy pose of a soul in 
 reference to "the truth." We are to be in 
 ^^ obedience to the truth." There is a stoop in 
 the word. It is a kneeling at attention. It is an 
 eager inclining of the ear to catch the whisper 
 of the Holy God. But it is more than that. It is 
 the attention of a soul that is girt and ready for 
 service. The wings are plumed for ministering 
 flight. It is a listening, for the purpose of a 
 doing. " Whosoever heareth these sayings of 
 Mine and doeth them." It is a soul waiting con- 
 sciously and eagerly upon the Holy Father with 
 the intent of hearing and doing His will. This is 
 " obedience to the truth," and this is the prelimi- 
 nary step in the creation and culture of God. 
 
 Now, let us pass to the vital succession 
 described in the text. We enter a second stage 
 Verse 22 of this progressive gradation. " Ye have purified 
 your souls in your obedience to the truth." 
 While ye were doing the one, ye were accom- 
 plishing the other. Obedience to truth is the 
 agent of spiritual perfection. Homage to holi- 
 ness is the minister of refinement. To bow to 
 the august is to enlarge the life. " He that 
 humbleth himself shall be exalted." To listen 
 in waiting attention for the expression of the 
 will of holiness is to fill the life with cleansing 
 and refining ministry. We bleach our fabrics 
 by exposing them to the Ught. We whiten 
 
CHAPTER I. 22-25 61 
 
 our spiritual garments by dwelling in the 
 hallowed glory of the Light of Life. We 
 " purify our souls " by our " obedience to the 
 truth." We jpurify them. We make them 
 chaste in all the varied meaning of that wealthy 
 word. We rid them of secret defilements, 
 washing quite out of the grain the soaking 
 filth of selfishness and of impure ambition. We 
 free them of all the uncouthness, the rudeness, 
 and the rough discourtesies of the unhallowed 
 life. We deliver them from the meretricious, 
 the tawdry graces that are made to do duty for 
 the fair realities of the sanctified life. The soul 
 is made grandly simple, endowed with the 
 winsome naturalness and grace of an unaffected 
 child. This is the way of the eternal. When we 
 dwell in the light, the powers of the soul are being 
 rarefied, touched, and moulded into ever finer 
 discernments. The organic quality of the life is 
 enriched, and possibilities awakened of which we 
 hardly dreamed. We transform our spiritual sub- 
 stance when we change our spiritual posture. We 
 '' purify our souls by our obedience to the truth." 
 Now, mark the next stage in this brightening 
 sequence. "Ye have purified your souls . . . unto 
 unfeigned love.'' We are rising into finer issues, ^'erse 22 
 We have passed from hallowed obedience to 
 purified spirit, and now we go on to unfeigned 
 affection ! The rarest issue of the rose-tree is 
 
62 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the perfume of the rose. From root to perfume 
 you ascend a gradation of increasing refine- 
 ments until you come to its subtle and bewitch- 
 ing breath. And here in my text we have 
 arrived at the sphere of fragrance, the realm 
 of sentiment, the haunt of affection. "Ye have 
 purified your souls . . . unto unfeigned love." 
 Mark the directive force of the preposition — 
 "purified unto love " ; as though the purification 
 of the soul made straight, as by a gracious 
 destiny, for the birth and revelation of love. 
 The spirit can be so chastened, so refined by 
 " obedience to the truth," that love will emerge 
 from it as naturally and spontaneously as 
 perfume distils from a rose. " He that hath my 
 commandments and keepeth them, he it is that 
 loveth ! " He cannot help loving ; his love is a 
 spontaneous affiuence, and he can no more 
 restrain it than the rose can imprison her 
 fragrance when she is tossed by the playful 
 breeze. A fine sentiment is the offspring of a 
 fine spirit. The posture of the soul determines 
 the quality of the disposition. If the soul 
 " live and move and have her being " in the 
 presence of the Holy Father, revealed in Christ 
 our Saviour, and shape her course in " obedience 
 to the truth," she will be sublimed, and all her 
 ministries will be attended by a gracious affec- 
 tion, diffusing itself as fragrance about the 
 
CHAPTER I. 22-25 63 
 
 common ways of men. " Ye have purified your 
 soul unto unfeigned love of the brethren." 
 
 But now it may occasion a little surprise 
 that, having reached this apparent climax in 
 the thought, the affluence of a spontaneous 
 affection, the apostle should add the injunction, 
 " love one another from a clean heart fervently I " Verse 22 
 What is the purpose of the apparently needless 
 addition? We have watched the ascending 
 stages in the spiritual processes that issue in 
 love ; what if there are ascending stages in 
 the refinement of love itseK? There may be 
 degrees of riches even in perfumes. Even love 
 itself may be refined into more and more 
 exquisite quality. That, I think, is the meaning 
 of the apostle's counsel. He urges them to 
 seek for the superlative in the sweet kingdom 
 of love, ever to set their minds on '' the things 
 above," and to fix their yearnings upon still 
 finer issues. We get a clear gHmpse into the 
 apostle's mind through the vivid word in which 
 he urges the counsel, '^ love one another . . . 
 fervently. ^^ There is a suggestion of increased 
 tension in the word, as when the string of a 
 violin has been stretched to a tighter pitch that 
 it might yield a higher note. That is the 
 apostle's figure — a little more tension, that you 
 may reach a little higher note. There are 
 heights of love unreached. Tighten the strings 
 
64 THE FmST EPISTLE OE PETER 
 
 of your devotion, that your soul may yield the 
 entrancing strains. Be vigilant against all 
 laxity, and stretch yourselves to the uttermost 
 in the endeavour to compass the manifold music 
 of the marvellous scales of love. When, there- 
 fore, the apostle enjoins a more fervent love, 
 I feel that he drives me back to the first pre- 
 liminary stage of spiritual growth. When he 
 appeals for higher notes of love, he is really 
 counselling a deeper holiness. If my love is to 
 be more intense, I must seek a " closer walk 
 with Grod." I must tighten my holiness if I 
 would enrich my music. There will come a 
 more discerning love when there is a more 
 devoted obedience. I shall pass from finer 
 homage to rarer spiritual purity, and from rarer 
 spiritual purity to increasing exquisiteness in 
 love. " Seeing you have purified your souls in 
 your obedience to the truth unto unfeigned 
 love of the brethren, love one another from a 
 clean heart fervently." 
 
 How can we depend upon this succession in 
 the processes? How can we be assured that 
 one stage will lead to another in inevitable 
 spiritual gradation ? What is the nature of the 
 bond and the quality of the guarantee ? What 
 is our assurance that " obedience to truth " will 
 issue in chaste refinement of spirit, and that 
 spiritual refinement will be crowned by a rare 
 
CHAPTER, I. 22-25 65 
 
 and fervent affection? The basis of our reli- 
 ance is " the word of God^ It was through Verse 23 
 the word of God there was given to us the 
 seed of a regenerated life. We were " begotten 
 again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible^ 
 through the word of God.^^ That word, through 
 which there came the first, faint seminal be- 
 ginnings of a holy life, remaineth sure through 
 all the stages of subsequent growth. We may 
 rely upon " the word of God." It " liveth and 
 abidethj^^ an energising all-enveloping atmo- 
 sphere, in which the beautiful young growth will 
 be matured. If the centre of love depended 
 upon the power of any human ministry, the 
 issue would assuredly fail. Our dependence 
 would then be built upon a thing enduring only 
 through a transient season. Human aid is but 
 '' as the grass " ; and the best of human aid, 
 the very glory of it, only as '' the flower of grass.'' Verse 24 
 In the fierce, scorching noontide, the time of 
 feverish strain, when we are most in need of 
 enriching rest, " the grass wither eth., and the flower 
 fallethj" and there is barrenness where we 
 yearned to find a soft and healing peace. No ; 
 not upon flesh must we depend for the evolu- 
 tion of the spiritual life. *' Our hope is in 
 God." The Lord Himself pervades the processes 
 find determines the line of ascending growth. 
 " The word of the Lord abideth for eve?\" Verse 25 
 
THE LIVING STONES AND THE 
 SPIRITUAL HOUSE 
 
 1 Petee ii. 1-10 
 
 Putting away therefore all wickedness^ and all guile, and 
 hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings, as newborn 
 babes, long for the spiritual milk which is without guile, 
 that ye may grow thereby unto salvation ; if ye have tasted 
 that the Lord is gracious : unto whom coming, a living 
 stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious, 
 ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, to be 
 a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable 
 to God through Jesus Christ. Because it is contained in 
 scripture. Behold, I lay in Zion a chief corner stone, electy 
 precious : and he that believeth on Him shall not be put to 
 shame. For you therefore which believe is the preciousness : 
 hut for such as disbelieve. The stone which the builders 
 rejrcted, the same was made the head of the corner ; and, 
 A stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence ; for they stumble 
 at the word, being disobedient : whereunto also they were 
 ap2>''inted. But ye are an elect race, a royal j^rlesthood, 
 a holy nation, a people for God^s own possession, that ye 
 may shew forth the excellencies of Him who called you out 
 of darkness into His marvellous light : which in time past 
 were no people, but now are the people of God : which had 
 not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy. 
 
 There is a wonderful ascending gradation in 
 the earlier portions of this great chapter. It 
 begins in the darkness, amid " wickedness " and 
 
 66 
 
CHAPTER II. 1-10 67 
 
 " guile " and *' hypocrisies," and it winds its way 
 through the wealthy, refining processes of grace, 
 until it issues in the '^marvellous light" of 
 perfected redemption. It begins with indi- 
 viduals, who are possessed by uncleanness, 
 holding aloof from one another in the bondage 
 of " guile " and " envies " and '' evil speakings " ; 
 it ends in the creation of glorious families, 
 sanctified communities, elect races, " showing 
 forth the excellencies " of the redeeming Lord. 
 "We pass from the corrupt and isolated indi- 
 vidual to a redeemed and perfected fellowship. 
 "We begin with an indiscriminate heap of un- 
 clean and undressed stones ; we find their con- 
 summation in a " spiritual house," standing 
 consistent and majestic in the light of the glory 
 of God. We begin with scattered units; we 
 end with co-operative communions. The subject 
 of the passage is therefore clearly defined. It 
 is concerned with the making of true society, 
 the creation of spiritual fellowship, the realisa- 
 tion of the family, the welding of antagonistic 
 units into a pure and lovely communion. 
 
 Where must we begin in the creation of this 
 communion ? The building of the house, says 
 the apostle, must begin in the preparation of 
 the stones. If the family is to be glorified, the 
 individual must be purified. A choir is no 
 richer than its individual voices, and if we wish 
 
68 THE FmsT EMSTLE OF PETER 
 
 to enricli the harmony we must refine the con- 
 stituent notes. The basis of all social reforma- 
 tion is individual redemption. And so I am 
 not surprised that the apostle, who is contem- 
 plating the creation of beautified brotherhoods, 
 should primarily concern himself with the pre- 
 paration of the individual. But how are the 
 stones to be cleaned and shaped and dressed 
 for the house ? How is the individual to be 
 prepared? By what spiritual processes is he 
 to be fitted for larger fellowships and family 
 communion? I think the apostle gives us a 
 threefold answer. 
 
 "jy ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious J^ 
 That is the basal clause of the entire chapter. 
 Everything begins here. It is no use our 
 dreaming of perfected human relationships 
 until the individual has deliberately tasted 
 the things that are Divine. A chastened 
 palate in the individual is a primary element 
 in the consolidation of the race. There must 
 be a personal experimenting with God. There 
 must be a willingness to try the spiritual 
 hygiene enjoined in the Gospel of Christ. We 
 must " taste and see " what the grace is like 
 that is so freely offered to us of God. We 
 must taste it, and find out for ourselves its 
 healthy and refreshing flavour. What is im- 
 plied in the apostle's figure? In the merely 
 
CHAPTER 11 1-10 69 
 
 physical realm, when we taste a thing, what 
 are the implications of the act ? When we take 
 a thing up critically for the purpose of dis- 
 cerning its flavour, there are at any rate two 
 elements contained in the method of our ap- 
 proach. There is an application of a sense, 
 and there is the exercise of the judgment. We 
 bring an alertness of palate that we may 
 register sensitive perceptions, and we bring an 
 alertness of mind that we may exercise a dis- 
 criminating judgment. Well, these two elements 
 are only symbolic of the equipment that is 
 required if we would *' taste and see how 
 gracious the Lord is." We need to present to 
 the Lord a sensitive sense and a vigilant mind. 
 There is no word which is read so drowsily as 
 the Word of God. There is no business so 
 sluggishly executed as the business of prayer. 
 If men would discern the secret flavours of the 
 Gospel, they must come to it wide awake, and 
 sensitively search for the conditions by which 
 its hidden wealth may be disclosed. " Son of 
 man, eat that thou findest. . . . Then did I eat 
 it, and it was in my mouth as honey for sweet- 
 ness." He had tasted and seen. " Eat that 
 thou findest ! " Well, the only way in which 
 we can eat a message is to obey it. Obedience 
 is spiritual consumption ; and in the act of 
 obedience, in the act of consumption, we discern 
 
70 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the wondrous flavours of grace. We are, there- 
 fore, to approach the Gospel of our Lord. We 
 are to patiently and sensitively realise its con- 
 ditions. We are to put ourselves in the attitude 
 of obedience, and, retaining a bright and wake- 
 ful mind, we shall begin to discern the glories 
 of our redemption. We shall taste the flavour of 
 reconciliation, the fine grace of forgiveness, and 
 the exquisite quality of peace. This is the primary 
 step in the creation of the family ; the individual 
 is to taste and appreciate the things of God. 
 
 All delights imply repulsions. All likes necessi- 
 tate dislikes. ^ strong taste for God implies a 
 strong distaste for the ungodly. The more refined 
 my taste, the more exacting becomes my standard. 
 The more I appreciate God, the more shall I de- 
 preciate the godless. I do not wonder, therefore, 
 that in the chapter before us the " tasting " of 
 Verse 1 grace is accompanied by a ^^ putting aiuay^' of 
 sin. If I welcome the one, I shall ^^ therefore ^^ 
 repel the other. The finer my taste, the more 
 scrupulous will be my repulsions. Mark the 
 ascending refinement in this black catalogue 
 of expulsions : " wickedness^ guile^ hypocrisies^ 
 envies, evil speakings I " The list ranges from 
 thick, soddened, compact wickedness up to un- 
 kindly speech, and I am so to grow in my Divine 
 appreciation that I just as strongly repel the 
 gilded forms of sin as I do those that savour of 
 
CHAPTER II. 1-10 71 
 
 the exposed and noisome sewer. The taste of 
 grace implies the '' putting away " of sin ; and 
 therefore the second step in the creation of the 
 family is the cleansing of the individual. Is 
 the cleansing essential ? Let us lay this down 
 as a primary axiom in the science of life — there 
 can be no vital communion between the unclean. 
 Why, we cannot do a bit of successful soldering 
 unless the surfaces we wish to solder are 
 vigorously scraped of all their filth. I suppose 
 that, in the domain of surgery, one of the 
 greatest discoveries of the last fifty years has 
 been the discovery of dirt, and the influence 
 which it has exercised as the minister of sever- 
 ance and alienation. It has been found to be 
 the secret cause of inflammation, the hidden 
 agent in retarded healing, the subtle worker in 
 embittered wounds ; and now surgical science 
 insists that all its operations be performed in 
 the most scrupulous cleanliness, and its intensi- 
 fied vigilance has been rewarded by pure and 
 speedy healings and communions. It is not 
 otherwise in the larger science of life. Every 
 bit of uncleanness in the individual is a barrier 
 to family communion. All dirt is the servant of 
 alienation. It is essential, if we would have strong 
 and intimate fellowships, that every member 
 be sweet and clean. "Therefore put away all 
 wickedness, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and 
 
72 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 envies and all evil speakings," and by purified 
 surfaces let us prepare ourselves for spiritual 
 communion. 
 Verse 2 '' As netvbom babes, long for the spiritual milky 
 Having tasted of the grace of the Lord, and 
 freeing yourselves from the embittering presence 
 of sin, adopt an exacting diet— '4ong for the 
 spiritual milk which is without guile^ Feed upon 
 the loftiest ideals. Suffer nothing of adulterating 
 compromise to enter into your spiritual food. 
 Nourish yourselves upon aspirations undefiled. 
 Do not let your wine be mingled with water. 
 Do not permit any dilution from the suggestions 
 of the world. " Long for the spiritual milk 
 Verse 2 which is without guile, that ye may grow thereby 
 unto salvation:' It is the unadulterated food 
 that ministers to growth. It is the high ideal 
 which lifts men to the heights. The loftiness of 
 one's aim determines the degree of one's growth. 
 In these matters my spiritual gravitation is 
 governed by my personal aspirations, my spirit 
 pursues the path and gradient of my desires. 
 
 Here, then, is the threefold preparation of 
 the individual for a family life of intimate and 
 fruitful fellowship— a personal experience of 
 grace, the expulsion from the life of all un- 
 cleanness, and the adoption of a rigorous and 
 uncompromising ideal. The whole preparatory 
 process is begun, continued, and ended in Christ. 
 
CHAPTER II. 1-10 73 
 
 In Christ the individual is lodged, and in His 
 grace, which is all-sufficient, he finds an abun- 
 dant equipment for the spacious purpose of his 
 perfected redemption. 
 
 Now, let us assume that the individual is ready 
 for the fellowship. We have got the -unit of 
 the family. We have got the "living stone," 
 cleansed, shaped, dressed, ready to be built into 
 the " spiritual house." How, now, shall the 
 society be formed ? What shall be its cement ? 
 What shall be its binding medium, and the 
 secret of its consistency ? Here are the " living 
 stones"; what shall we do with them? " [/"^if o Verses 4, 5 
 ivhom coming , , , as living stones ye are 
 built up a spiritual housed " Unto whom 
 coming ! " The living stones are to find their 
 bond of union in the living Christ. The alpha 
 of all enduring communion is Christ. We 
 cannot prepare the individual stones without 
 Christ. We cannot build the individual stones 
 into a house without Christ. He is the " corner 
 stone," and the pervading strength of every 
 enduring structure. What is the implication of 
 all this ? It is this. We cannot have society 
 without piety. We may have juxtapositions, 
 connections, clubs, fleeting and superficial re- 
 lationships, but the only enduring brotherhood 
 is the brotherhood which is built upon faith. 
 Apart from the Christ there can be no social 
 
74 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 cohesion. The Word of God proclaims it, and 
 history confirms it. Every preposition seems 
 to have been exhausted by the Word of God 
 in emphasising the necessity of a fundamental 
 relationship with Christ — '' in Christ," " through 
 Christ," "by Christ," "with Christ," "unto 
 Christ." In every conceivable way Christ is 
 proclaimed as the all-essential. In seeking to 
 create societies we have therefore got to reckon 
 with the Christ. We cannot ignore Him. He 
 will not be ignored. We either use Him or we 
 fall over Him. We use Him and rise into 
 strength, or we neglect Him and stumble into 
 Verses 7, 8 ruin. We either make Him the " head of the 
 corner^^ or He becomes our " stone of stumbling, 
 and a rock of offence^ Societies and families and 
 nations, which are not built upon the Christ, fall 
 to pieces, thrown into ruin by the very '' law 
 of the spirit of life." But have not societies 
 been built upon the Christ, and yet been far 
 from manifesting the glory of a radiant, family 
 communion ? Look at the sects ! Is not Christ 
 the corner stone, and yet where is the sweet 
 communion ? Ah ! it is when the different 
 communities have got away from the Christ 
 that their communion has been destroyed. It 
 is when the sects get away from the spirit of 
 the Christ, when they become wranglers about 
 a letter, when they are heated by the fever of 
 
CHAPTER II. 1-10 75 
 
 personal vanity, and lust for the spoils of 
 sectarian triumph — it is then that the spiritual 
 house collapses, and lies scattered in a heap of 
 inhospitable fragments. But when we build 
 upon Him, when He, and He only, is " the 
 preciousness," when all our personal aims are 
 merged in line with His, when we have the 
 Spirit of Christ, then are we bound into a 
 gracious communion, into a vital and funda- 
 mental unity. And into what is He prepared 
 to build us ? This chapter is overflowing in 
 the wealth of the figures by which it seeks to 
 express the glorious mission. He will build us 
 into a ^^ spiritual house^^^ a spacious home, en- Verse 5 
 closing but one tenant, the gracious Spirit of 
 God. He will distinguish us as " an elect race^''^ Verse 9 
 moving in the world, yet not of it, standing 
 out in strong relief from the discordant and 
 fragmentary life by which it is surrounded. 
 He will endow us with all the dignities of " a 
 royal priesthoods^ ^ having kingly and priestly 
 prerogatives, reigning with Christ in the realm 
 of the spirit and exercising a powerful ministry 
 of intercession in the most holy presence of God. 
 He will constitute us " a holy nation,^^ a people 
 whose policies shall be purities, and whose state- 
 craft shall just be the enlightened administration 
 of large and unselfish minds. This is what our 
 God is prepared to make of us. It is a great 
 
76 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 ideal, but then we have a great Father and 
 a great Saviour and a mighty Spirit, and vast 
 ideals are native to the very spirit of our re- 
 demption. It is a grand house which the Lord 
 would build, and if only He had the stones 
 the majestic edifice would speedily be reared. 
 
 And what is to be the mission of the glorified 
 fellowship ? If even two or three are gathered 
 together, by common possession of the Spirit 
 of Christ, into a sanctified society, what purpose 
 is to be achieved by their communion? They 
 Verse 9 are to '* shew forth the excellencies of Him who 
 called them o%d of darkness into His marvellous 
 lights The " elect race " will be distinguished 
 by its cheeriness, its geniality, its radiant sym- 
 pathies, its abounding optimism. It will be of 
 little use our professing that we are " called 
 into marvellous light " if our society is only the 
 home of controversy, or the abode of a brooding 
 melancholy and depression. The redeemed 
 society is composed of '' children of light." 
 Verse 10 We are to prove that " now we are the people 
 of God,^^ that we have been naturalised — or 
 shall I say supernaturalised ? — into the kingdom 
 of God, and we are to prove it by bringing 
 into common affairs the air of a better country, 
 a loftier tone, a finer temper, a nobler spirit. 
 " Our citizenship " is to be " in heaven," and 
 we are to " shew forth the excellencies of God " 
 
CHAPTER II. 1-10 77 
 
 in tlie lightsomeness and spirituality of His 
 people. Sucli is to be the ministry of the 
 spiritual society which our Father will create 
 out of His reconciled and sanctified children. 
 Such is to be the " spiritual house," built up of 
 '* living stones," and having as its one and only 
 foundation Jesus Christ, our Lord. 
 
THE MINISTRY OF SEEMLY 
 BEHAVIOUR 
 
 1 Peter ii. 11-17 
 
 Beloved, I beseech you as sojourners and pilgrims, to 
 abstain from flesJdy lusts which war against the soul ; 
 having your behaviour seemly among the Gentiles; thatt 
 wherein they speak against you as evil-doers, they may by 
 your good ivorks, ivhich they behold, glorify God in the day 
 of visitation. Be subject to every ordinance of man for the 
 Lord's sake : whether it be to the king, as su]7reme ; or unto 
 governors, as sent by him for vengeance on evil-doers and for 
 praise to them that do ivell. For so is the ivill of God, that 
 by well-doing ye should put to silence the ignorance of foolish 
 men : as free, and not using your freedom for a cloke of 
 wickedness, but as bondservants of God. Honour all men. 
 Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king. 
 
 This is an appeal for the evangelising influences 
 of a chaste and winsome character. It is an 
 apostolic entreaty to consider the immeasurable 
 momentum of a beautiful life. It is a glorifi- 
 cation of the silent witness of saintliness. It is 
 not given to all men to have the faculty and 
 function of the prophet, his clear sight, and his 
 power of fruitful interpretation. The per- 
 
 78 
 
CHAPTEE II. 11-17 79 
 
 suasive, wooing speech, of the evangelist is not 
 an element in the common endowment. The 
 evangelist and the prophet may be only infre- 
 quent creations, and their gifts may have only 
 a limited distribution. But we may all exercise 
 the ministry of beauty. Every man may be an 
 ambassador of life, discharging his office through 
 the medium of holiness. Every man may be 
 an evangelist in the domain of character, dis- 
 tributing his influence through the odour of 
 sanctity, in seemliness of bebaviour, in exquisite 
 fitness of speech, in finely finished and well- 
 proportioned life. This is a ministry for every- 
 body, the apostleship of spiritual beauty. And 
 so in the passage before us the apostle is 
 engaged in delineating the features of the 
 character that tells. He is depicting a forceful 
 life. He is exhibiting the behaviour which is 
 influential in leading men to reverent thought 
 and religious inquiry and spiritual conviction. 
 "What are these public aspects of the sanctified 
 life ? By what kind of living can we best 
 arouse the interest of the world in the claims 
 and kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ ? How may we become powerful evan- 
 gelists, even though we have been denied the 
 gift of tongues ? How may we arrest the world 
 in fruitful wonder ? Let us seek the answer in 
 the apostolic word. 
 
80 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 Verse 11 " Abstain from fleshly lusts." That is the first 
 note in the forceful life. Do not let us so 
 narrow its interpretation that the majority of 
 us escape the grip of the apostle's injunction. 
 Let us attribute a comprehensive content to 
 the unwelcome word *' lust." Lust includes the 
 entire army of unclean forces which are an- 
 tagonistic to the exalted realm of the spirit. It 
 includes not only the carnal desire, but the 
 jealous eye and the itching palm. It compre- 
 hends every form of heated and feverish motion 
 which is destructive of spiritual treasure. 
 Fleshly lust is anything in the life which steams 
 the windows of the spirit. Fleshly lust is 
 therefore inclusive of envy, jealousy, avarice, 
 insatiable selfishness, and immoderate ambition. 
 " Abstain from fleshly lusts," from any excessive 
 heat which maintains its fire by consuming the 
 furniture of the soul. 
 
 Now, what is this but a plea for the ascen- 
 dency of spirit? It is a plea for the mag- 
 nificent passion of moderation, and for the 
 imposing grace of a noble self-restraint. " Ab- 
 stain from fleshly lusts." Do not let any fire 
 get outside the bars. Do not let the flames 
 reach the furniture. Hold everything in its 
 place. Suffer no usurpation. Do not let the 
 lower supplant the higher. Eigidly observe 
 the distinction of subject and sovereign, and 
 
CHAPTER II. 11-17 81 
 
 preserve the purity of the throne. Such is the 
 all-inclusive meaning of the apostolic counsel. 
 In the constitution of man there is a Divine 
 order. His powers are arranged in ranks and 
 gradations. The science of life is the doctrine 
 of gradation; the art of living is the recog- 
 nition of gradation. I suppose that George 
 Combe did a great service to the cause of 
 practical thinking when, seventy years ago, he 
 wrote his work on The Constitution of Man. 
 I am not aware that there was anything new 
 in the philosophy of the book. It only con- 
 firmed the teaching of the entire range of 
 philosophy stretching back from his own day 
 to the days of Socrates and Plato. And 
 what was the teaching ? That the powers of 
 the human personality are arranged in heighten- 
 ing gradation, and that the secret of beau- 
 tiful living consists in awarding to each 
 rank its own precise and peculiar value. The 
 service rendered by George Combe consisted 
 in the attempt to make this philosophy a plain, 
 practical rule for common life. I find in the 
 resources of my personality regiments of 
 diverse powers. I find vital forces, affectional 
 forces, social forces, moral forces, spiritual 
 forces. I find elements whose kinship is with 
 the swine, and I find elements which have the 
 lustre and the preciousness of pearls. What ia 
 
82 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the art of successful and forceful living. " Give 
 not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither 
 cast ye your pearls before swine." Do not 
 treat swine and pearls as though they were of 
 equal value. Eecognise an aristocracy among 
 the powers, and to them give the preference 
 and the sovereignty. When there are two calls 
 in the life, the bark of the dog and a voice 
 from the sanctuary, " give not that which is 
 holy unto the dogs," but ever keep the lowest 
 under the severe jurisdiction of the highest. 
 *' Abstain from fleshly lusts." Do not allow any 
 lower power to prowl about in loose licentious- 
 ness. Keep the chain on. " Let your modera- 
 tion be known unto all men." Exercise the 
 ministry of a well-ordered life. Let all the 
 powers in the life be well drilled, well disciplined, 
 healthily ranked, each one in its place, from 
 the private soldier up to the commander-in- 
 chief. "Abstain from fleshly lusts." The 
 primary characteristic of forceful, influential 
 character is the ascendency of the spirit. 
 Verses " Be subject to every ordinance of man for the 
 LorcVs sake: whether it be to the Idng^ as supreme; 
 or unto governors, as sent by him for vengeance 
 on evil-doers and for praise to them that do 
 welly That is the second element that tells — 
 * Be subject to every ordinance ... to the 
 king ... or unto governors ! " Is there any 
 
CHAPTER 11. 11-17 83 
 
 suggestion of forcefulness in the counsel? It 
 appears to indicate the cringing obedience 
 of boneless weaklings. I thought that the 
 influential character was conspicuous for its 
 beauty. Is there anything of beauty in this 
 apparent servility ? John Euskin has told us 
 that one of the primary elements of beauty 
 is the element of repose. But he is careful to 
 explain that by repose he does not mean the 
 weak passivity of a pebble lying upon the 
 highway, but the repose of a mountain, with 
 its protruding rocks revealing themselves like 
 gigantic muscles. It is repose suggestive of 
 might, hinting of splendid power in reserve. 
 May we translate the axiom into our interpre- 
 tation of spiritual beauty ? Spiritual beauty 
 must not have the repose and passivity of a 
 pebble : it must display muscle, and be sug- 
 gestive of irresistible strength. Character that 
 tells must be the ally of power. Its very sub- 
 missions must be indicative of strong nobility. 
 Its bendings must not be the bendings of the 
 invertebrate, but the voluntary, reasonable 
 homage of a splendid will. What, then, is all 
 this about, this submitting to ordinances and 
 kings and governors? Whatever else it may 
 mean, it is not the bending of reeds, but the 
 devotion of giants. Here, I think, is the secret. 
 A Christian man is one who clearly recognises 
 
84 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the necessity of social order. The sanctity of 
 society is a cardinal element in his faith. The 
 hallowing of human relationship is not one 
 whit behind the hallowing of himself. The 
 ultimate purpose of redemption is to make an 
 orderly family out of a disorderly race. The 
 Christian will not stand aloof from his fellows. 
 He will not walk the lonely way of isolation, or 
 assume an attitude of selfish aggression. He 
 will not maintain a stern individualism, in which 
 the claims and rights of others are ignored. He 
 will recognise the hallowedness of social fellow- 
 ships, and he will strongly accept his social 
 obligations. He will bend himself to the dis- 
 charge of civic duties, and put his shoulder 
 beneath the responsible burden of national life. 
 He will fit himself into the social order, into the 
 body corporate, and he will willingly share his 
 blood in the common life. 
 
 If this be evangelistic character, the character 
 that tells upon "the Gentiles," then Christian 
 life is not perfected and beautified where the 
 hallowing of the social order is ignored. When 
 civic duty is neglected, and national obligation 
 is overlooked, the fair circle of spiritual devotion 
 is broken. "Be subject to every ordinance 
 of man for the Lord's sake ... to the king . . . 
 or unto governors." Bend your strength into 
 an intelligent obedience which will be creative 
 
CHAPTER 11. 11-17 85 
 
 of a larger and more fruitful corporate life. I 
 liave no personal doubt as to what we should do 
 with kings and governors if their rule minister 
 to moral chaos and disorder. The sovereignty- 
 is only hallowed when it works to hallowed 
 ends. If this predominant purpose is violated 
 by the supreme king or governor, a man's very- 
 reverence for social sanctities will transform him 
 into a rebel. It was because our fathers were 
 possessed by hallowed civic instincts, and by a 
 burning eagerness for pure and righteous cor- 
 porate life, that they hurled Charles I. from the 
 throne, and in his rejection and dethronement 
 pledged their souls to a deepened devotion to 
 the sovereignty of God. A primary character- 
 istic of forceful, evangelistic character is the 
 serious recognition of the sanctity of corporate 
 life. 
 
 " As free^ and not using your freedom for a cloke Verse 16 
 of wickedness, hut as bondservants of GodJ' Here 
 is another aspect of the influential life — " Using 
 your freedom ... as bondservants." All privi- 
 lege is used with a sense of responsibility. 
 All exercise is taken " as ever in the great Task- 
 master's eye." No freedom is permitted to 
 become licence. Every liberty is under the 
 dominion of a fine restraint. Why, a sense of 
 responsibility and restraint is essential even to 
 the appreciation of freedom itself. Restraint is 
 
86 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 always creative of refined perceptions. The 
 ascetic can discern finer flavours than the 
 glutton. The man who puts reins upon his 
 appetite has a more delightful appreciation 
 of his food. He must be a bondslave to 
 appreciate his freedom. It is even so with 
 every manner of freedom. It is only re- 
 sponsible exercise that discovers their luxurious 
 essence. Licence, in any kind of freedom, 
 works to coarseness, to injury, and to waste. 
 Is this word altogether inopportune for our 
 own day? Are there no alluring freedoms 
 which may entice us into licence ? Freedom of 
 thought! "tJse your freedom as the bond- 
 servants of God." No man has a right to think 
 as he likes. No man has a right to think about 
 the unworthy, or to contemplate the unclean. 
 In the domain of the mind, it is the man who 
 angles in narrow waters who has the wealthiest 
 haul. Freedom of speech ! " Use your freedom 
 as the bondservants of God." Exercise it with 
 severe restrictions. "Let no communication 
 proceed out of your mouth but what is edifying." 
 In all these freedoms the element of responsi- 
 bility is the saving salt, and sometimes the 
 element of responsibility will cause the freedom 
 to be unused. If a man resign his freedom to 
 take intoxicating drink that he may the better 
 minister to an imperilled brother, I cannot 
 
CHAPTER 11. 11-17 87 
 
 but think that in reality lie is no bondslave, 
 but the Lord's freeman, and that his deed will 
 not appear unworthy when it is placed 
 in the searching rays of the Eternal Light. 
 In the character that tells, the responsible 
 use of freedom is a great and influential 
 factor. 
 
 " Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear Verse 17 
 God. Honour the king.'' ''Honour all men!" 
 The injunction includes the entire circle of 
 human relationships. "Honour!" "Fear!" 
 " Love ! " What do the counsels mean except 
 this— that our entire life is to to be passed in 
 the exercise of an all-inclusive reverence. We 
 are to move about in the spirit of homage, 
 expecting that at any time, and anywhere, we 
 may come upon crowned sovereignties before 
 which it will be well for us to bow in serious 
 and grateful regard. If we are irreverent, 
 monarchs will be continually passing us, but 
 they will not be known. They will pass " like 
 ships in the night." Eeverence is the very 
 spirit of perception. Frivolity has no eyes, 
 and so it bestows no honour. Censoriousness 
 is blind, and so is never aroused into love. 
 Pride walks with a heavy veil. The cocksure 
 never rest in the deep quietness of the Divine 
 certainties. It is the man who walks in 
 reverence, the man who feels the mystery 
 
88 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 of all things, whetlier lie be contemplating 
 common men or kings or God, who enters 
 into the secret treasure-house, and discovers 
 unsuspected wealth. We should see more in 
 one another if the angel of reverence dwelt 
 near the springs of our Hfe. It is the man who 
 stands in reverence before flowers, and little 
 children, and his own loved ones, and his leaders, 
 and his God, to whom are revealed the secret 
 essences which turn life into a garden of 
 unspeakable delights. 
 
 These, then, are some of the characteristics of 
 the "seemly behaviour," which, working through 
 the medium of holiness, proclaim the glory of 
 God — the ascendency of spirit, the aspiration 
 after social sanctity, the responsible use of 
 freedom, and the ceaseless exercise of reverence. 
 These are the primary aspects of the forceful life 
 which works mightily in the evangelisation of 
 the world. As to what would be the issues of 
 such a life the apostle proclaims a triumphant 
 Verse 12 hope. " The Gentiles,'^ the great unleavened 
 mass of men, " by your good works, which they 
 heholdj^^ shall ^^ glorify God in the day of 
 visitation.'^ The beautiful life is to raise their 
 thoughts in homage to the glorious God. 
 When they behold the Divine realised in the 
 human, they too are to be wooed into heavenly 
 fellowships. They are to be wooed, not by the 
 
CHAPTER II. 11-17 89 
 
 eloquence of our speech, but by the radiance 
 of our behaviour. By the imposing grace of 
 noble living we are to ^^ put to silence the Veise 15 
 ignorance of foolish menj'^ and that silence will 
 be for them the first stage in a life of aspiring 
 consecration. 
 
THE SUFFERINGS OF CHEIST 
 
 1 Peter ii. 21-25 
 
 For hereunto were ye called : because Christ also suffered 
 for you, leaving you an example, that ye should follow His 
 steps : who did no sin, neither ivas guile found in His mouth : 
 who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He 
 suffered, threatened not ; hut committed Himself to Him that 
 judgeth righteously : who His own self bare our sins in His 
 body upon the tre^, that we, having died unto sins, might 
 live unto righteousness ; by whose stripes ye were healed. 
 For ye were going astray like sheep ; but are now returned 
 unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls. 
 
 Yeises ^^ Christ also suffered . . . who did no sin^ 
 ^^' ^^ The two phrases must be conjoined if either 
 is to receive an adequate interpretation. The 
 earlier term discloses its significance by the light 
 of the later term. If we would know the content 
 and intensity of the suffering, we must know 
 the character of the sufferer. "Christ also 
 Verse 21 suffered.'' The word is indeterminate until I 
 know the quality of His life. Suffering is a 
 relative term. The measure of its acuteness is 
 determined by the degree of our refinement. 
 The same burden weighs unequally on different 
 
 90 
 
CHAPTER II. 21-25 91 
 
 men. Lower organisation implies diminished 
 sensitiveness The higher the organisation the 
 finer becomes the nerve, and the finer the nerve 
 the more delicate becomes the exposure to 
 pain. The more exquisite the refinement, the 
 more exquisite is the pang. 
 
 I do not limit the principle to the domain 
 of the flesh. It is a matter of familiar know- 
 ledge that in the body it is regnant. There are 
 bodies in which the nerves seem atrophied or 
 still-bom, and there are bodies in which the 
 nerves abound like masses of exquisitely sensi- 
 tive pulp. But the diversity runs up into the 
 higher endowments of the life, ino the esthetic 
 and affectional and spiritual domains of the 
 being. The man of little aesthetic refinement 
 knows nothing of the aches and pains created 
 by ugliness and discord. The rarer organisa- 
 tion is pierced and wounded by every jar and 
 obliquity. It is even so in the realm of the 
 affections. Where affection burns low, neglect 
 and inattention are unnoticed ; where love burns 
 fervently, neglect is a martyrdom. If we rise 
 still higher into the coronal dominions of the 
 life, into the domain of moral and spiritual 
 sentiments, we shall find that the degree of 
 rectitude and holiness determines the area of 
 exposure to the wounding, crucifying ministry 
 of vulgarity and sin. 
 
92 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 "Christ also suffered . . . who did no sin." 
 We must interpret the rarity and refinement of 
 His spirit if we would even faintly realise the 
 
 Verse 22 intensity of His sufferings. " Who did no sin^ 
 neither was guile found in His mouth." " No 
 sin ! " The fine, sensitive membrane of the soul 
 had in nowise been scorched by the fire of 
 iniquity. " No sin ! " He was perfectly pure and 
 healthy. No power had been blasted by the 
 lightning of passion. No nerve had been 
 atrophied by the wasting blight of criminal 
 neglect. The entire surface of His life was as 
 finely sensitive as the fair, healthy skin of a 
 
 Verse 22 little child. " Neither tvas guile found in His 
 mouthy There was no duplicity. There were 
 no secret folds or convolutions in His life con- 
 cealing ulterior motives. There was nothing 
 underhand. His life lay exposed in perfect 
 truthfulness and candour. The real, inner mean- 
 ing of His life was presented upon a plain 
 surface of undisturbed simplicity. " No sin ! " 
 Therefore nothing blunted or benumbed. " No 
 guile!" Therefore nothing hardened by the 
 effrontery of deceit. I ask you to try to 
 imagine the immense area which such a life 
 laid open to the wounding implements of un- 
 faithfulness and sin. 
 
 Now, it is a Scriptural principle that all sin is 
 creative of insensitiveness. " The wages of sin 
 
CHAPTER II. 21-25 93 
 
 is death," deadened faculty, impaired perception. 
 " His leaf shall wither ! " Sin is a blasting 
 presence, and every fine power shrinks and 
 withers in the destructive heat. Every spiritual 
 delicacy succumbs to its malignant touch. I 
 suppose that Scripture has drawn upon every 
 sense for analogies in which to express the 
 ravages of sin in the region of perception. Sin 
 impairs the sight, and works towards blindness. 
 Sin benumbs the hearing and tends to make men 
 deaf. Sin perverts the taste, causing men to 
 confound the sweet with the bitter, and the bitter 
 with the sweet. Sin hardens the touch, and 
 eventually renders a man '' past feeling." All 
 these are Scriptural analogies, and their common 
 significance appears to be this — sin blocks and 
 chokes the fine senses of the spirit ; by sin we 
 are desensitised, rendered imperceptive, and the 
 range of our correspondence is diminished. Sin 
 creates callosity. It hoofs the spirit, and so 
 reduces the area of our exposure to pain. 
 
 " Who did no sin ! " No part of His being 
 had been rendered insensitive. No perception 
 had been benumbed by any callous overgrowth. 
 Put the slightest pressure upon the Master's life, 
 and you awoke an exquisite nerve. " And they 
 disputed one with another who should be 
 greatest." ..." And Jesus perceivioig their 
 thoughts ! " How sensitive the perception ! The 
 
94 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 touch of a selfish thought crushed upon the 
 nerve, and stirred it into agony. Such is the 
 sensitiveness of sinlessness, and in this vulgar, 
 si'lfish, and sinful world it could not be but that 
 the Sinless One should be " a Man of Sorrows," 
 and that He should pass through pangs and 
 martyrdoms long before He reached the appal- 
 ling midnight of Gethsemane and Calvary. 
 *' Christ also suffered . . . who did no sin." 
 
 Now, let us watch this sensitive Sufferer, so 
 quick and apprehensive in every nerve, and let 
 us contemplate the nature of some of the suffer- 
 Verse 23 ings He endured. " He was reviled:' Give the 
 word its requisite intensity. He was vilified, 
 vituperated, slandered ! "What was the shape of 
 the reviling ? He was denounced as a liar ! " He 
 deceiveth the people." Why, even with our blunt 
 and benumbed consciousness, there is no charge 
 like falsehood for tearing us with poignant 
 pain. There is no word which pierces to the 
 quick and stabs the very marrow, like the awful 
 word " liar ! " But to the Pure One, with His 
 unimpaired perception, and in whose hfe the 
 truth lay as fair and white as newly fallen 
 snow, the charge of falsehood would create un- 
 utterable pain. "Christ also suffered," being 
 reviled. What was the shape of the revilings ? 
 *'This man blasphemeth ! " This meek and 
 lowly Being, walking ever in the stoop of 
 
CSAPTEE il. 21-25 95 
 
 reverence, seeking ever to be well pleasing to 
 His Father, now charged, by those He came to 
 save, with irreverent and sacrilegious speech. 
 His sacred ministry belied as profanity! "He 
 hath a devil, and is mad ! " " He casteth out 
 devils by Beelzebub, the prince of the devils ! " 
 This holy and sensitive Christ, whose one 
 evangel was to tell men of His own sweet 
 companionship with the Father, and whose one 
 mission was to raise them into the delights of 
 the same eternal fellowship, now charged with 
 living in league with the devil, the evil despotism 
 from which He sought to deliver them ! It is the 
 proof of our own benumbment if we do not feel 
 that such accusations resulted in spiritual cruci- 
 fixion. "He was reviled . . . He suffered^ The Verse 2: 
 suffering covers the whole scope of the Passion, 
 from the dull pangs of the physical crucifixion 
 to the sharper and more terrible pangs of the 
 crucifixion of the spirit. Now, I say, take this 
 Man of the sinless, guileless life ; let Him move 
 amid the chaos of selfishness, the riot of lust- 
 fulness, the cruelty of thoughtlessness, the chill- 
 ing insults of studied neglect and contempt ; 
 let Him be made the victim of incivility; let 
 there be withheld from Him the common 
 courtesies; let Him be denied the hospitable 
 kiss, and the kindly gift of water for His tired 
 feet ; let rough men roughly handle Him ; let 
 
96 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 them mock Him and deride Him; and as the 
 very consummation of coarse vulgarity, let them 
 go up to this Man of exquisite refinement, and 
 spit in His face, and then let them subject Him 
 to all the howling, laughing brutality of the 
 crucifixion,— I say, watch all this, gaze steadily 
 upon it, look long upon all its repellent offensive- 
 ness, and while you keep in mind the exquisite 
 sensitiveness of the Sufferer, you will enter 
 with a little more power of interpretation into 
 that familiar cry, " Behold, and see if there be 
 any sorrow like unto My sorrow ! " " His visage 
 was so marred more than any man." " He was 
 a Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief." 
 
 We may not know, we cannot tell, 
 What pains He had to bear. 
 
 How did the Lord endure His sufferings? 
 Verse 23 " When He luas reviled^ He reviled not againJ' 
 The bitter attack was not creative of bitter 
 retahation. The hurled venom did not poison 
 His springs. Amid the environing bitterness 
 the Man of Nazareth remained sweet. I have 
 sometimes heard bitter retaliation justified on 
 the plea that even the sweetest milk will 
 turn sour under the influence of a prolonged 
 storm. I am doubtful of the accuracy of the 
 physical analogy, but I am confident of the 
 inaccuracy of the spiritual inference. It is 
 
CHAPTER 11. 21-25 97 
 
 possible for "the milk of human kindness" 
 to be kept sweet in the most tempestuous 
 weather. " When He was reviled, He reviled 
 not again.'' Is the example too remote? 
 Come down, then, from the high, cool altitudes 
 of the Master's abode, and let us see if the 
 milk can be kept sweet in the presumably 
 more sultry vales of common men. Here is 
 a man with a stormy, tempestuous life,— " in 
 stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent. 
 ... Of the Jews five times received I forty 
 stripes save one. . . . Thrice was I bealen 
 with rods, once was I stoned ... in weari- 
 ness, in painfulness, in watchings often, in 
 hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold 
 and nakedness!" Did the milk keep sweet? 
 All these things he suffered of the Jews. When 
 he was reviled, did he revile again ? "I could 
 wish myself accursed from Christ for my 
 brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh ! " 
 "My heart's desire and prayer to God for 
 Israel is, that they may be saved!" I thought 
 that out of the heart of the tempest I might 
 hear the angry shout of retaliation; instead 
 of which I hear a sweet and self-forgetful 
 prayer, sounding like silvery village bells in 
 a night of storm. The spirit was not em- 
 bittered. The milk was not soured. The 
 apostle was just the Master over again. " When Ver.e 23 
 
98 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETEB 
 
 Verse 23^6 suffered^ He threatened not^ There was 
 no violent menace in the Master's life. There 
 was no dark, fateful hinting of a day of 
 vengeance. There was no sullen, angry biding 
 of His time for the season of retaliation. He 
 remained quiet, unembittered, sweet, and " com- 
 mitted Himselj]^^ in happy confidence, and with 
 ever-increasing assurance, " to Him that judgeth 
 righteously.^^ 
 
 Such was the Sufferer, such were His suffer- 
 ings, and such the way in which He endured 
 them. What were the fruits of this tran- 
 scendent endurance? If I were even to attempt 
 to give an exhaustive reply to the great inquiry, 
 I should have to quote the New Testament 
 record from end to end. On every page one 
 can find the enumeration and catalogue of 
 the gracious fruits. Their proclamation is the 
 New Testament glory. But just look at the 
 pregnant summary given by the apostle Peter 
 in the passage of our text. '' Christ also suffered 
 
 Verse 24 . . . that we might live^ What is the signifi- 
 cance of the word? Out of His sufferings 
 there issues a vital energy for the reviving 
 and enlivening of the race. It is evidence 
 whose testimony cannot be ignored that 
 when the heart is crushed with sin, and is 
 sinking under the burden, it turns its eyes to 
 those scenes in the Saviour's life where His 
 
CHAPTER n. 21-25 99 
 
 sufferings are most abounding. Men in whose 
 vitals the poison of the devil is dwelling, and 
 whose spiritual force is ebbing away, do not 
 tarry at Bethlehem, or even upon the great 
 Mount where the great -teaching was given. 
 They make their way to Gethsemane and 
 Calvary. It is when we are feeling respectable 
 that Calvary has no allurement. But when the 
 heart is bleeding in unclean tragedy, when life 
 ceases to be a debating society topic, a light 
 subject of controversy for a quiet summer's eve, 
 when the burden of sin weighs down upon us with 
 heavy and intolerable load, it is then we follow 
 the pilgrim band along the well-trodden way 
 to Gethsemane and Calvary, that in the fellow- 
 ship of the august Sufferer we might discover 
 the vital energy of a restored and reinvigorated 
 life. " Christ also suffered , . . that we might 
 live." " By whose stripes ye were healedJ^ Do Verse 24 
 not let us overlook the experience because 
 we cainot find an explanation. Do not let us 
 reject the fact because we cannot contrive a 
 theory. The sorest places in human life, the' 
 raw, festering wounds of indwelling sin, can 
 only be remedially touched by the healing 
 influence of His stripes. The miracle is re- 
 peated ever}^ day. The sufferer from sin turns 
 for release to the suffering Christ. There is a 
 strange allurement about " the Man of Sorrows " 
 
100 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 to which the common heart bears witness. " I, 
 if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me ! " 
 The word proclaims the magnetic influence of 
 
 Verse 25 the uplifted, suifering Christ. " Ye were going 
 astray like sheep ; hut are now returned " ; ye have 
 come h(m3 again, wooed and allured by the 
 wondrous spectacle of a suffering God ! Such are 
 the issues of the calm endurance of this sensi- 
 tive Sufferer — vital energies, full of reviving 
 and healing ministry, wooing us back to God. 
 
 And now this unspeakable ministry of suffer- 
 ing is proclamed as an example to all men. 
 
 Verse 21 " Christ also sT:iffered, leaving you an example^ 
 that ye should follow His steps J^ Do not let 
 us shrink from the tremendous sequence. If 
 the calm, strong endurance of the Master has 
 been creative of transcendently blessed ministry, 
 so our endurance will be productive of vital 
 powers which will work for the enrichment of 
 I9-2? ^^^^ ^^GQ' " ^0 welV Have " conscience toward 
 Gody ^^ Follow His steys^ Let no revilings 
 make thee desist, let no sufferings turn thee 
 sour, and thy very endurance shall make thee 
 a large contributor to the co-operative forces 
 of the kingdom of God. To remain sweet 
 under coarse reviling is to be a fountain of 
 healing energy. To remain unselfishly prayerful 
 in the presence of menace is to bring currents of 
 heavenly air into the atmosphere of common 
 
CHAPTER II. 21-25 101 
 
 life. All fine endurance is a force of renewal, 
 which contributes its quota of energy to the 
 ultimate emancipation of the race. I am glad 
 that this superlative passage springs out of 
 counsel to a slave. I am glad that these 
 stupendous heights are connected by a well- 
 made road with this very lowly estate. I am 
 glad that the endurance of Jesus is placarded 
 before a slave. The apostle tells the slave that 
 he too may be an element and factor in the 
 universal emancipation and redemption. The 
 slave may accomplish more by calm endurance 
 than by hasty, precipitate revolt. Fine, noble 
 endurance is energy — an energy which raises 
 the common temperature, and to raise the 
 temperature will more effectively remove the 
 burden of icy bondage than the hasty attacks 
 of ten thousand men armed with the pickaxe 
 of premature revolt. Let us do well ; let us 
 have conscience towards God ; let us endure, if 
 need be, the contradiction of sinners ; let us 
 persist even through sufferings, and, by the 
 very nobility of our endurance, we shall be 
 leavening the world with the emancipating 
 forces of the Christian redemption. " Christ 
 also suffered, leaving you an example." " The 
 things which happened unto me have turned 
 out rather unto the furtherance of the Gospel." 
 " If we suffer we shall also reign with Him." 
 
WIVES AND HUSBANDS 
 
 1 Peter iii. 1-8 
 
 In like manner,, ye wives, he in subjection to your own 
 husbands ; that, even if any obey not the word, they may 
 without the word be gained by the behaviour of their wives ; 
 beholding your chaste behaviour coupled with fear. Whose 
 adorning let it not be the outivard adorning of plaiting the 
 hair, and of wearing jeivels of gold, or of putting on ap- 
 parel ; but let it he the hidden man of the heart, in the 
 incorrujHible apparel of a meek and quiet spiHt, which is 
 in the sight of God of great price. For after this manner 
 aforetime the holy women also, who hoped in God, adorned 
 themselves, being in subjection to their own husbands : as 
 Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord : whose children 
 ye now are, if ye do well, and are not put in fear by any 
 terror. Ye husbands, ^?^ like manner, dwell with your wives 
 according to knowledge, giving honour unto the woman, as 
 unto the weaker vessel, as being also joint- heirs of the grace 
 of life; to the end that your prayers he not hindered. 
 Finally, be ye all likeminded, comjMSsionate, loving as 
 brethren, tenderhearted, humbleminded. 
 
 Where shall we begin our interpretation of this 
 influential passage ? The starting-place of the 
 exposition has much to do with the character 
 and quality of its issues. Everybody knows the 
 starting-place of a superficial and short-sighted 
 curiosity. It fastens its primary attention upon 
 
 102 
 
CHAPTER III. 1^ 103 
 
 the words " subjection," '' fear," " obedience." 
 These are the words which are regarded as the 
 points of emphasis. Around these words the 
 interest gathers and culminates. The rest of 
 the broad passage is secondary, and takes its 
 colour from their determination. I propose to 
 reverse the order. We will begin with the 
 broad significance of the passage, and then 
 reason backwards to the content of the indi- 
 vidual words. We will gaze upon the entire 
 face, and then take up the interpretation of 
 single features. If we begin with the words 
 *' subjection," " fear," " obedience," with no help- 
 ful clue of interpretation, we shall have a 
 perverted and destructive conception of the 
 dignity of womanhood. But if we begin with 
 the broad, general portraiture of the wife and 
 the husband, their mutual relationships will 
 stand revealed as in the clear light of a radiant 
 noon. In the passage for exposition the apostle 
 delineates some of the spiritual characteristics ^ 
 of the ideal husband and the ideal wife. Let ^ ' 
 us quietly gaze at the portraiture, if perchance 
 some of its beauty may steal into our spirits, 
 and hallow common life with the light and 
 glory of the blessed God. 
 
 Where does the apostle begin in his por- 
 traiture of the ideal wife ? " Chaste heaviourJ' Verse 
 
104 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 The first element in worthy womanhood is the 
 wearing of the white robe. The spirit is per- 
 fectly clean. "The King's daughter is all 
 glorious within." All her powers consort 
 together like a white-robed angel-band. In 
 every room of her life one can find the fair 
 linen, " clean and white." In the realm of the 
 imagination her thoughts hover and brood 
 like white doves. In the abode of motive 
 her aspirations are as sweet and pure as the 
 breathings of a little child. In the home of 
 feeling, her affections are as incorruptible as 
 rays of light. I|f you move among the powers 
 of her speech, on the threshold of her lips you 
 will find no stain, no footprint of '' anything 
 that defileth or worketh abomination, or maketh 
 a lie." In the inner life of the ideal woman, no 
 unclean garment can be found, for everything 
 wears the white robe. The spirit is " chaste." 
 But chasteness is more than cleanliness. The 
 stone is not only white, it is chiselled into 
 delicacy. Character is not left in the rough ; it 
 is refined into thoughtful finish. The substance 
 is not only pure, it is worked into beauty. It is 
 not only true in matter, it is consummated in 
 exquisite manner. If the analogy of purified 
 womanhood is to be found in the whiteness of 
 the snow, its finish is to be found in the graceful 
 curves and forms of the snowdrift. " Chaste 
 
CHAPTER III. 1-8 105 
 
 behaviour " is just the refined purity of all the 
 activities of the inner life. 
 
 Refined purity is therefore the primary ele- 
 ment in the ideal wife, and it is the first essential 
 in human communion. There can be no vital 
 communion where both the communicants are 
 not clean. "When dirt intrudes, fellowship is de- 
 stroyed. Corruption is the antagonist of cohesion. 
 " The wicked sJiall not stand J^ Their very un- 
 cleanness eats up the consistency and brings the 
 structure to ruin. When uncleanness breaks 
 out in the family circle, the family cannot 
 " stand." If envy take up its abode, or 
 jealousy, or any type of carnal desire, the fair 
 and beautiful circle is broken. The great family 
 of the redeemed, '' the multitude whom no man 
 can number," are one in the wearing of the 
 " white robe." Their consistency and solidarity 
 are found in their purity, and in the absence 
 of all the alienating forces of uncleanness and 
 defilement. It is not otherwise in the relation- 
 ship of husband and wife. The wearing of 
 the white robe is the primary essential to 
 their communion. " Keep thy garments always 
 white " ! Does the ideal appear insuperable ? 
 Then let me proclaim another word : " They 
 shall walk with Me in white ! " That is not a 
 command ; the words enshrine a promise. 
 *' Walking with Me, they shall be white," The 
 
106 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 whiteness is the result of the companionship. 
 ** I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye 
 shall be clean." The sprinkling is not a transi- 
 tory act ; it is a permanent shower. The forces 
 of the cleansing Spirit are sprayed upon our 
 powers just as the antiseptic is sprayed upon 
 the exposed wound to ward off and destroy the 
 subtle forces of contamination and defilement. 
 To be a companion of the Lord is to have the 
 assurance of purity. "The fear of the Lord 
 is clean." 
 
 What is the second element in the portraiture 
 Verse 4 of the ideal wife ? " iL meek and quiet spirit." 
 There is nothing cringing or servile in the 
 disposition. It is infinitely removed from the 
 saddening, paralysing obeisance of the slave. 
 **I am meek," cries the Master; and can we 
 detect anything fawning or fearful about 
 the Son of Man? In the interpretation 
 of the great word, let us eliminate from our 
 minds every suggestion of servility and ser- 
 vitude. Meekness is just the opposite to 
 self-aggressiveness and violent self-assertion. 
 Meekness is just self-suppression issuing in 
 beneficent service. Meekness does not tread 
 the narrow path of a selfish ambition, tending 
 only to some self-enriching end. Meekness takes 
 broad, inclusive ways to large -and unselfish ends. 
 Meekness seeks the enrichment of life through 
 
CHAPTEE III. 1-^ 107 
 
 the compreliension of the many. Self-assertion 
 may appear to succeed, but it never really wins. 
 It may gain a telescope, but it loses an eye. It 
 may win an estate, but it loses the sense of 
 the landscape. It may gain in goods what it 
 loses in power. " It may gain the whole world, 
 and lose its own soul." The meek are the only 
 true '' heirs." They gain an ever finer per- 
 ceptiveness, and life reveals itself in richer 
 perfumes and flavours and essences with every 
 passing day. " The meek shall inherit the 
 earth." 
 
 "A meek and quiet spirit." A quiet spirit! 
 The opposite to that which we describe as 
 " loud." The '' loud " woman is the ostentatious 
 woman, moving about in broad sensations. "He 
 shall not cry " ; there was nothing loud about Him, 
 quite an absence of the scream : " neither shall 
 any man hear His voice in the streets " ; there 
 shall be nothing about Him of the artifice 
 of self-advertisement. The Master was never 
 "loud," and so He was a most winsome and 
 welcome companion. The " loud " woman is 
 never companionable. The difference between 
 a "loud" woman and a woman of "quiet 
 spirit " is the difference between fireworks and 
 sunshine, between a quiet, genial glow and 
 a crackling bonfire. The apostle contrasts 
 the " quiet spirit " with the love of sensational 
 
108 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 attire and loud adornments, the disposition 
 to arrest attention by vulgar dazzle and dis- 
 play. The disposition is a fatal foe to real 
 communion. After all, we cannot bask in the 
 glare of fireworks; we rejoice in the quiet 
 sunlight. Home is made of quiet materials, 
 and one of the elements in the constitution 
 of beautiful wedded fellowship is " a meek and 
 quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of 
 great price." 
 
 What is the third element in the per- 
 verse 6 traiture of the ideal wife? ^^ Not put in fear 
 by any terror J^ How shall I describe the 
 disposition? Let me call it the grace__of 
 repose. *' Not put in fear by any terror." 
 They are not the victims of " sudden, wild 
 alarms." They are not easily aroused into the 
 fearfulness which is so often the parent of 
 thoughtlessness. They have reposefulness of 
 spirit. Now, if I may be allowed to say it, I 
 think this fearfulness is more characteristic of 
 women than of men. There are larger enemies 
 inside the gates of men's gardens; but in the 
 garden of woman's life, I think that the heat 
 of fearfulness and the slugs of worry and fret- 
 fulness will be found to be more abounding. 
 Fearfulness is destructive of the deeper delights 
 of human fellowship. Restfulness is essential 
 to deep and fruitful communion. 
 
CHAPTER III. 1-8 109 
 
 "What are the lineaments of the ideal husband ? 
 *' Biuell with your wives according to knowledge.''^ Verse 7 
 How shall we describe the characteristic ? 
 Let lis call it the atmosphere of reasonableness. 
 " According to knowledgeJ^ We may grasp its 
 content by proclaiming its opposite : " Dwell 
 with your wives according to ignorance. Just 
 walk in blindness. Don't look beyond your own 
 desires. Let your vision be entirely intro- 
 spective and microscopic. Never exercise your 
 eyes in clear and comprehensive outlook. Dwell 
 in ignorance ! " No, says the apostle, " dwell 
 according to knowledge." Keep your eyes 
 open. Let reason be alert and active. Let all 
 your behaviour be governed by a sweet reason- 
 ableness. Don't let appetite determine a doing. 
 Don't let thy personal wish have the first and 
 last word. Exalt thy reason ! Give sovereignty 
 to thy reason ! Be thoughtful and unceasingly 
 considerate. It is the absence of this prevailing 
 spirit of reasonableness which has marred and 
 murdered many a bright and fair-promising 
 communion. " He is not really bad at heart, 
 but he doesn't think ! " That is the fatal defect. 
 He does not think ! He dwells according to 
 ignorance ; his reason is asleep, and the beautiful, 
 delicate tie of wedded fellowship is smitten, 
 wounded, and eventually destroyed. 
 
 " Giving honour unto the woman^ as unto the Verse 7 
 
110 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 lueaker vessel^ Giving honour, paying homage, 
 bowing down in tlie spirit in the posture of 
 serious and religious regard. To the atmosphere 
 of reasonableness we are to add the temper of 
 reverence. Now, see the wealthy suggestiveness 
 of this. Reverence impUes at least two things- 
 perception and homage. We must first see a 
 thing before we can pay it regard. We must first 
 behold a dignity before we can pay homage to it. 
 Homage implies perception : perception implies 
 eyes. How are the seeing eyes obtained ? Let 
 us lay this down as an axiom : it is only the 
 lofty in characlier that can discern the spiritual 
 dignities in life. Men of little nature cannot 
 apprehend spiritual magnitudes. John Ruskin 
 has told his countrymen that they are incapable 
 of depicting and portraying the sublime, because 
 they cannot see it I You know his explanation. 
 He says there is in the Englishman's character 
 an element of burlesque which has shortened 
 and dimmed his sight, and rendered him in- 
 capable of discerning the superlative glories of 
 far-off spiritual heights. Whatever may be the 
 quality of the inference, the basal principle is 
 true. Perception implies elevation, and we 
 cannot see the enduring dignities of Hfe unless 
 we ourselves are dignified. To truly revere a 
 woman, a man himself must be good. He must 
 dwell on high. He must abide in the heavenly 
 
CHAPTER III. 1-8 111 
 
 places in Christ. He must bathe his eyes in 
 heaven, and he will acquire a power of per- 
 ception which will discern in his wife, and in 
 aU womankind, spiritual dignities which will 
 preserve his soul in the abiding posture of 
 lowly and reverent regard. The husband will 
 see in his wife a ^^ joint-heir of the grace o/verse7 
 Z^/e," and in that perception every relation- 
 ship is hallowed and enriched. The master who 
 sees in his servant a "joint-heir of the grace 
 of life," and the servant who perceives in his 
 master a similarly enthroned dignity, will create 
 between themselves a relationship which will 
 be the channel of "the river of the water of 
 life." " Give honour unto the woman," and to 
 preserve that sense of reverent perceptiveness, 
 a man must dwell in "the secret place of the 
 most High." 
 
 What is the last lineament in this ideal 
 portraiture ? How else must the husband live ? 
 " That your prayers be not hindered:' His Verse 7 
 conduct has to be the helpmeet of his prayers. 
 There has to be no discord between the one and 
 the other. The spirit of his supplications is to 
 be found in his behaviour. When he has been 
 into the garden of the Lord in lonely com- 
 munion, the fragrance of the ilowers has to cling 
 to his garments when he moves about in the 
 common life of the home. Here is a man, living 
 
112 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 out his own prayers, taking the spirit of his 
 communion into ordinary conduct, so demeaning 
 himself that his highest aspirations may receive 
 fulfilment. Whatever he prays for he seeks 
 to be, finding a pertinent duty in every supplica- 
 tion. Who would not covet such a companion- 
 ship ? The character of the ideal husband is 
 just a beautiful commingling of reasonableness 
 and reverence, manifesting itself in conduct 
 which is in harmony with the range and aspira- 
 tions of his prayers. 
 
 Here, then, are the spiritual portraitures of 
 the wife and the husband : on the one hand, the 
 robe of purity, the ornament of modesty, the 
 grace of repose ; on the other hand, an atmo- 
 sphere of reasonableness, the temper of reverence, 
 and the conformity of conduct and prayer. 
 What, now, in the light of such relationships, 
 can be the content of such terms as " subjection," 
 *' obedience," " fear " ? The partners are a wife, 
 clothed in purity, walking in modesty, with a 
 reposefulness of spirit which reflects the very 
 glory of God; and a husband, walking with 
 his wife according to knowledge, bowing before 
 her in reverence, and pervading all his behaviour 
 with the temper of his secret communion with 
 the Lord. There is no room for lordship, there 
 is no room for servility. The subjection of the 
 
CHAPTER III. 1-8 113 
 
 one is paralleled by the reverence of the other. 
 I say there is no lordship, only eager helpful- 
 ness ; there is no subjection, only the delightful 
 ministry of fervent affection. The relationship 
 is a mutual ministry of honour, each willing to 
 be lost in the good and happiness of the other. 
 "Wherefore, " subject yourselves one to the other 
 in the fear of Christ," that in the communion of 
 sanctified affection you may help one another into 
 the light and joy and blessedness of the Christian. 
 
BE PITIFUL 
 
 1 Peter iii. 8 
 
 Finally^ he ye all likeminded, compassionate, loving as 
 brethren, tenderhearted, humhleminded. 
 
 " Be pitiful ! " Here the standard of authority 
 is set up in the realm of sentiment, and 
 obedience is demanded in the domain of 
 feeling ! I did not anticipate that the Christian 
 imperative would intrude into the kingdom of 
 the feelings. I thought that feelings would 
 lie quite outside the sphere of authority. I 
 thought that feelings could not be made to 
 order, and yet here is an order in which their 
 creation is commanded ! " Be pitiful ! " I 
 could have understood a commandment which 
 dealt with the external incidents and manifesta- 
 tions of life. I should not have been surprised 
 had there been laid upon me the obligation of 
 hospitality — hospitality may be commanded. 
 But then, hospitality need not touch the border- 
 lands of feeling. Hospitality may be generous 
 and plentiful, and yet noble and worthy feeling 
 
' CHAPTEE III. 8 115 
 
 may be absent. Hospitality may be a matter 
 of form, and therefore it can be done to order. 
 I should not have been surprised had I been 
 commanded to show beneficence. Beneficence 
 may be exercised while sentiment is numb. It 
 is possible to have such a combination as cal- 
 lous prodigality. Beneficence may therefore be 
 created by authority. But here in my text 
 the imperative command enters the secret 
 sanctuary of feeling. It is not concerned with 
 external acts: it is concerned with internal 
 disposition. It is not primarily a service which 
 is commanded, but a feeling. But can feelings 
 be made to order ? Charity can : can pity ? 
 Labour can: can love? "This is My command- 
 ment, that ye love one another." " Love one 
 another with a pure heart fervently." "Be 
 kindly affectioned one to another." "Be pitiful." 
 The order is clear and imperative : can I obey 
 it? Authority commands me to be pitiful: 
 then can pity be created by an immediate 
 personal fiat ? Can I say to my soul, " Soul, 
 the great King commands thee to be arrayed 
 in pity ; bring out, therefore, the tender senti- 
 ment and adorn thyself with it as with a robe"? 
 Or can a man say to himself, " Go to ; this day I 
 will array myself in love, and I will distribute 
 influences of sweet and pure affection ! I will 
 unseal my springs of pity, and the gentle waters 
 
116 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 shall flow softly through all my common affairs"? 
 Such mechanicalised affection would have no 
 vitality, and such pity would be merely 
 theatrical— of no more reality or efficacy than 
 the acted pity of the stage. FeeHngs cannot 
 rise matured at the mere command of the 
 will. 
 
 But, now, while I may not be able to 
 produce the sentiment of pity by an act of 
 immediate creation, can I rear it by a thoughtful 
 and reasonable process? I cannot create an 
 apple, but I can plant an apple-tree. I cannot 
 create a flower, but I can create the requisite 
 conditions. I can sow the seed, I can give the 
 water, I can even arrange the light. I can 
 devote to the culture thoughtful and ceaseless 
 care ; and he who sows and plants and waters 
 and tends is a fellow-labourer with the Eternal 
 in the creation of floral beauty. What we 
 cannot create by a fiat we may produce by a 
 process. It is even so with the sentiments. 
 Feelings cannot be effected at a stroke ; they 
 emerge from prepared conditions. Pity is not 
 the summary creation of the stage; it is the 
 long-sought product of the school. It is not the 
 offspring of a spasm; it is the child of discipline. 
 Pity is the culmination of a process ; it is not 
 stamped as with a die, it is grown as a fruit. 
 The obligation therefore centres round about 
 
CHAPTER III. 8 117 
 
 the process ; the issues belong to my Lord. 
 Mine is the planting, mine the watering, mine 
 the tending; God giveth the increase. When, 
 therefore, I hear the apostolic imperative, '' Be 
 pitiful ! " I do not think of a stage, I think of 
 a garden ; I do not think of a manufactory, I 
 think of a school. 
 
 Let us now consider the process. " Be 
 pitiful ! " That is the expression of a fine 
 feeling ; and if life is to be touched to such 
 exquisite issues, life itself must be of fine 
 material. Fine characteristics imply fine 
 character. You will not get fine porcelain 
 out of pudding-stone. The exquisiteness of 
 the result must be hidden in the original 
 substance. If you want rare issues, you must 
 have fine organic quality. Some things are 
 naturally coarser than others, and there are 
 varying scales of refinement in their products. 
 The timber that would make a good railway 
 sleeper would not be of the requisite texture 
 for the making of violins. I saw, only a little 
 while ago, the exposed hearts of many varieties 
 of Canadian timber. In some the grain was 
 coarse and rough ; in others the grain was 
 indescribably close and compact, presenting a 
 surface almost as fine as the rarest marble. 
 Their organic qualities were manifold, and 
 their destinations were as manifold as their 
 
118 THE FmST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 grain. Some passed to rough-and-tumble usage ; 
 others passed to the ministry and expression 
 of the finest art. These organic distinctions 
 are equally pronounced when we ascend to 
 the plane of animal life. The differing 
 grains of timber find their analogy in the 
 differing constitutions of an ordinary dray-horse 
 and an Arab steed. You cannot harness 
 the two beasts to the same burden and work. 
 The sensitive responsiveness of the one, its 
 quivering, trembling alertness, makes it fitted 
 for ministries in which the other would find 
 no place. It is again the repetition of the 
 chaste porcelain and the common mug. It 
 is not otherwise when we reach the plane of 
 man. There is the same difference in grain. 
 Our organic qualities are manifold. Look 
 at the difference in our bodies. Some have 
 bodies that are coarse and rough, dull and 
 heavy, with little or no fine apprehension of 
 the beauty and perfume and essences of the 
 material world. Others have bodies of the 
 finest qualities, alert and sensitive, responding 
 readily to the coming and going of the 
 exquisite visitors who move in sky or earth, 
 on land and sea. In our bodies we appear 
 to differ as widely as Caliban and Ariel— the 
 thing of the ditch, and the light and buoyant 
 creature of the air. Now, dare we push our 
 
CHAPTER III. 8 119 
 
 investigation further? Do these organic 
 differences appertain to the realm of the soul ? 
 Are there not souls which seem to be rough- 
 grained, organically and spiritually coarse? 
 The very substance of their being, the basis 
 of motive and thought and feeling and 
 ambition, is inherently vulgar, and they seem 
 incapable of these finer issues of tender pity 
 and chaste affection. Now, where character is 
 rough-grained fine sentiments are impossible. 
 You can no more elicit pity from vulgarity 
 than you can elicit Beethoven's Sonatas from 
 undressed cat-gut. If we would have fine 
 issues, we must have rare character. If we 
 would have rare pity, we must become 
 refined men. 
 
 What, then, can be done ? Can we do anything 
 in the way of culture ? Can the organic quality 
 be changed ? Can we make coarseness retire 
 before the genius of refinement ? It is surprising 
 how much we can do in the kingdom of nature. 
 By assiduous care we can transform the harsh 
 and rasping crab-apple into the mild and genial 
 fruit of the table; and we can, by persistent 
 englect, drive it back again into the coarseness 
 of the wilderness. It is amazing how you can 
 bring a grass-plot under discipline, until even 
 the rank grass seems to seek conformity with 
 the gentler turf ; and it is equally amazing how 
 
120 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 by neglect and indifference you can degrade 
 a lawn into a common field. In the realm 
 of garden and field organic qualities can be 
 changed. Does the possible transformation 
 cease when we reach the kingdom of man? 
 Can dull and heavy bodies be refined? Is it 
 possible to alter the organic quality of a man's 
 flesh ? It is much more possible than the 
 majority of people assume. By thoughtful 
 exercise, by reasonable diet, by firm restraint, 
 by " plain living and high thinking," it is 
 possible to drive the heaviness out of our 
 bodies, and to endow them with that organic 
 refinement which will be the revealing minister 
 of a new world. Can the transformation proceed 
 further ? Let me propound the question which 
 is perhaps one of the greatest questions that 
 can come from human lips : Is it possible to go 
 into the roots and springs of character, into the 
 primary spiritual substance which lies behind 
 thought and feeling, and change the organic 
 quality of the soul ? If this can be done, the 
 creation of pity is assured ! If the coarse fibres 
 of the soul can be transformed into delicate 
 harp-strings, we shall soon have the sweet and 
 responsive music of sympathy and affection ! 
 Can it be done? Why, this transformation 
 is the very glory of the Christian evangel ! 
 What do we want accomplishing ? "We 
 
CHAPTER III. 8 121 
 
 want the secret substance of the life chastened 
 and refined, that it may become vibratory to 
 the lives of our fellows. What think you 
 then of this evangel? ''He sits as a refiner." 
 And what is the purpose of the Eefiner ? Let 
 the Apostle Paul supply the answer, " We are 
 renewed by His Spirit in the inner man." 
 The Eefiner renews our basal spiritual sub- 
 stance, takes away our drossy coarseness, and 
 makes our spirits the ministers of refinement. 
 And what are the conditions of obtaining 
 refinement? The conditions are found in com- 
 munion: ''His Spirit in the inner man": it 
 is fellowship between man and his Maker; it 
 is the companionship of the soul and God. All 
 lofty communion is refining ! All elevated 
 companionships tend to make me chaste ! What, 
 then, must be the transforming influence of the 
 companionship of the Highest ? We can see its 
 ministry in the lives of the saints. Lay your 
 hand upon any one, man or woman, who walks 
 in closest fellowship with the risen Lord, and 
 you will find that the texture of their life is 
 as the choicest porcelain, compared with which 
 all irreligious lives are as coarse and common 
 clay. By communion with the Divine we 
 become " partakers of the Divine nature." 
 In fellowship we find the secret of spiritual 
 refinement, and in spiritual refinement are 
 
122 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 found the springs of sympathy. To be pitiful 
 we must become good. Our pity is born of 
 our piety. 
 
 But there is a second step in the process to 
 which I must briefly direct your thought. It is 
 not enough to be organically refined. Eefined 
 faculties must be exercised. A man may have 
 a brain of very rare organic quality, and yet 
 the particular function of the brain may be 
 allowed to remain inactive and immature. It is 
 not enough for me to become spiritually refined ; 
 I must exercise my refined spirit in the ministry 
 of a large discernment. Now, for the creation 
 of a wise and ready sympathy, there is no power 
 which needs more continuous use than the power 
 of the Imagination. I sometimes think, look- 
 ing over the wide breadths of common life, that 
 there is no faculty which is more persistently 
 denied its appropriate work. " Look not every 
 man on his own things, but every man also on 
 the things of others." Such vision calls for the 
 exercise of the imagination. "Put yourself in 
 his place." Such transposition demands the 
 ministry of the imagination. If the imagination 
 be not exercised, we offer hospitality to the 
 shrieking sisterhood of bigotry and intolerance. 
 If a pure and refined imagination had been at 
 work, how could an Anglican clergyman have 
 declared that the Nonconformists are "in mad 
 
CHAPTEE III. 8 123 
 
 alliance with Anarchists " ? And if a refined 
 imagination had been in exercise, how could 
 a Nonconformist have spoken of the Bishops 
 as " caring little for the cause of Christ so long 
 as they could suffocate Dissenters " ? How much 
 a refined imagination would have helped in 
 the mutually sympathetic understanding of Pro- 
 Boers and Anti-Boers ? When this faculty is 
 sleeping, evil things are very much awake ! But 
 for my immediate purpose I am asking for the 
 exercise of the imagination in respect to things 
 which would be otherwise insignificant. Imagi- 
 nation is second sight. Imagination is the eye 
 which sees the unseen. Imagination does for 
 the absent what the eye does for the present. 
 Imagination does for the distant what the eye 
 does for the near. The eye is concerned with 
 surfaces ; imagination is busied with depths. 
 The dominion of the eye terminates at the 
 horizon ; at the horizon, imagination begins. 
 Imagination is the faculty of realisation ; it 
 takes a surface and constructs a cube ; it takes 
 statistics, and fashions a life. Here is a surface 
 fact : " Total of patients treated in the Queen's 
 Hospital during 1901, 31,064." The eye ob- 
 serves the surface fact and passes on, and 
 pity is unstirred. The imagination pauses at 
 the surface, lingers long, if perchance she 
 may comprehend something of its saddening 
 
124 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 significance. Imagination turns the figures 
 over; 31,064! Then these afflicted folk would 
 fill twenty buildings, each of them the size 
 of the chapel at Carrs Lane. Says Imagina- 
 tion, '' I will marshal the pain-ridden, bruised 
 crowd in procession, and they shall pass my 
 window and door, one a minute, one a minute, 
 one a minute ! How long will it take the 
 procession to pass ? Twenty-one days ! " But 
 what of the units of the dark and tearful proces- 
 sion? Imagination gets to work again. Have 
 you a child down ? They are like him. Have you 
 a brother falling, or a sister faint and spent? 
 They are like them. Have you known a mother 
 torn and agonised with pain, or a father crushed 
 and broken in his prime ? They are like him. 
 Have you gone down the steep way to the 
 death-brink, and left a loved one there ? Some 
 of these, too, have been left at the brink, 
 and their near ones are climbing up the steep 
 way again alone ! This is how refined imagi- 
 nation works, and, while she works, her sister, 
 Pity, awakes and weeps ! But if pity is not 
 to be smothered again, the aroused impulse 
 must be gratified and fed. I know that pity 
 can give " ere charity begins," but charity 
 confirms pity, and strengthens and enriches it. 
 Feelings of pity, which do not receive fulfilment 
 in charity or service, may become ministers 
 
CHAPTER III. 8 125 
 
 of petrifaction. Let our piety be the basis of 
 our pity; let our imagination extend our 
 vision; and from this area of hallowed out- 
 look there will arise rivers of gracious sympathy, 
 abundantly succouring the children of pain 
 and grief. 
 
CHEIST SANCTIFIED AS LOED 
 
 1 Petee iii. 8-15 
 
 Finally^ he 'ye all likeminded, compassionate^ loving as 
 "brethren, tenderhearted, humhleminded : not rendering evil 
 for evil, or reviling for reviling ; hut contrariwise Messing; 
 for hereunto were ye called, that ye should inherit a blessing. 
 For, He that would love life, and see good days, let him 
 refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no 
 guile : and let him turn away from evil, and do good ; let 
 him seek peace, and pursue it. For the eyes of the Lord are 
 upon the righteous, and his ears unto their supplication: 
 hut the face of the Lord is upon them that do evil. And 
 who is he that will harm you, if ye he zealous of that which 
 is good ? But and if ye should suffer for righteousness' 
 sake, blessed are ye : and fear not their fear, neither he 
 troubled ; hut sanctify in your hearts Christ as Lord : being 
 ready always to give answer to every man that asketh you a 
 reason concerning the hope that is in you, yet with meekness 
 and fear. 
 
 Verse 15 " Sanctify in your hearts Christ as Lord.^^ The 
 heart is a sanctuary. It is a place of worship. 
 "Worship is always proceeding. There is a large 
 congregation. Who are the worshippers ? Let 
 me name a few. There are our wishes, our 
 ambitions, our motives, our willings. All these 
 are worshippers, bowing in the heart before 
 126 
 
CHAPTEE III. 8-15 127 
 
 some enthroned and sovereign Lord. Our dis- 
 positions are also among the crowd. All the 
 forces of thought and feeling are mingled in 
 the varied congregation ! Go into the sanctuary 
 of any heart, and you will find, kneeling side by 
 side in homage and obeisance, wishes, motives, 
 sentiments, purposes, dispositions, all bowing 
 before some central shrine. Who is the Lord 
 of the temple ? In some temples it is Mammon ! 
 He is sanctified as Lord, and round him are 
 kneeling the congregated thoughts, passions, 
 and ambitions, oifering him incense, supplication, 
 and praise. Who is the Lord ? In some temples 
 it is the Lord of Misrule. He is sanctified as 
 Lord ! Chaos reigns, and in riotous disorder the 
 mob of tumultuous thoughts and feelings offer 
 him noisy acclamation. Who is the Lord of the 
 temple ? In some temples indifference is en- 
 throned. Indifference is sanctified as Lord! 
 The atmosphere is opiated ; life is a lounge ; 
 everything comes and goes in carelessness ; all 
 the worshippers are narcotised in thoughtlessness, 
 or sunk in profound and perilous sleep. Who is 
 the Lord of the temple ? In some temples it is 
 the devil. Every worshipper bends in adoration 
 of vice, reciting the liturgy of uncleanness, 
 and every member of the congregation, every 
 thought, every feeling, every ambition, bears 
 upon its forehead the mark of the beast. Who 
 
128 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 is the Lord of the temple ? In some temples it 
 is the Christ. All the assembled forces and 
 powers of the life willingly prostrate themselves 
 in fervent and lowly worship. Every hour of 
 the day there is a worshipper in the radiant 
 temple ! Now it is a wish, now a shaping plan, 
 now a completed purpose, now a penitent 
 feeling, now a gay delight — these all stoop in 
 reverent homage before the exalted Christ, and 
 as we always appropriate the worth of the object 
 we worship, the bending congregation of thoughts 
 and sentiments acquire the beauty of the Lord. 
 The worshipping motive is chastened and refined; 
 the kneeling wish is etherealised ; the stooping 
 sorrow is transfigured ; all the reverent forces 
 of the personality are transformed into children 
 of light. Who is the Lord in the temple? 
 That is the all-determining question. " Sanctify 
 in your hearts Christ as Lord." In your temple 
 let the Christ be enthroned. Let everything in 
 the life be made to kneel in that sanctuary. 
 Bring ye everything to the foot of the great 
 white throne. Let the Lord be King ! " Little 
 Verse 15 children, keep yourselves from idols." 
 
 ^''Sanctify in your hearts Christ as Lord^ 
 That is the creative centre of the passage. All 
 the surrounding context is resultant and con- 
 sequent. This is the all-originating fountain! 
 Around it are stretches of land, threaded with 
 
CHAPTER III. 8-15 129 
 
 rivers which, are the children of its creative 
 springs. Let us pass from the springs to the 
 rivers. If Clirist be sanctified in the heart as 
 Lord, if everything in the deep, secret places of 
 the life bow before His throne, if at Matins and 
 Evensong, and through all the intervening hours 
 of the day, the endless procession of mystic 
 forces in the soul reverently bend to His 
 dominion, what will be the quality of the issues, 
 what will be the striking characteristics of the 
 life? 
 
 Are you surprised that the apostle's answer 
 begins with an enumeration of the softer graces : 
 " compassionate, tenderhearted, hunibleminded " ? Verse 8 
 Did you anticipate that he would begin with 
 ^attributes more majestic, more manly and com- 
 manding ? Is it disappointing that the apostle 
 should give emphasis to graces which we com- 
 monly associate with women rather than with 
 men ? I have called them the softer graces ; 
 perhaps I ought to have called them the riper 
 fruit. The ultimate expression of the strongest 
 tree is its sweetest and ripest fruit. The tender, 
 exquisite colour of a ripening acorn is the finest 
 expression of the oak. Hearts of oak reach 
 their finished achievement in the softest hues 
 of their ripest fruit. Manliness is never perfected 
 until it issues in tenderest grace. Therefore I 
 am not surprised to find the apostle giving 
 
130 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 prominence to the finished and ripened attain- 
 ments in sanctified life. What, again, are their 
 names ? 
 Verses ''''CoTnpassionP The range of a man's life is 
 just the range of his compassions, which is only 
 another name for the range of his correspond- 
 ences. Death is just the destruction of all 
 correspondence. The dying lose correspondence 
 after correspondence ; nerve after nerve and 
 sense after sense collapse ; communications are 
 slowly broken ; and by gradual paralysis and 
 benumbment all correspondences end. The 
 measure of my life is determined by the quality 
 and quantity of my correspondences. This is 
 true of the life of the flesh. It is true in the 
 realm of the mind. How much am I in touch 
 with ? What is the range of my interests ? 
 What are my correspondences? It is true in 
 the domains of the soul. How much do I live ? 
 That depends upon my compassion, my re- 
 sponsiveness, my " correspondence." What is 
 the extent of my fellow-feeling? What is my 
 power of apprehending and realising my brother, 
 and by the ministry of an unveiling imagination 
 planting myself in the heart of his interests and 
 estate? That is one of the rarest attainments 
 in the sanctified life. The Lord refines His 
 disciples into compassionateness. He indefinitely 
 enlarges their correspondences. He endows 
 
CHAPTER III. 8-15 131 
 
 them with sensitive passion, with profundity of 
 feeling. ''Deep calleth unto deep," and they 
 maintain fruitful fellowship with the joys and 
 sorrows of their fellow-men. 
 
 " Tenderheartedness.'" That carries one a step verse 8 
 further than compassion. Tenderheartedness 
 is more than correspondence ; it is gentle 
 ministry. It includes the service of the tender 
 hand. It not only feels the pains of others ; it 
 touches the wounds with exquisite delicacy. 
 Even the pitiful man can be clumsy. Six men 
 may have the sympathy, but only one of the six 
 may be able to touch the wound so as to heal 
 it. The Lord will add a gentle hand to our 
 compassion. He will take away all brusqueness, 
 all spiritual clumsiness, so that in the very 
 ministry of pity we may not '' break the bruised 
 reed, nor quench the smoking flax." 
 
 " Humblemindedness.'^ Surely that adds a verse 8 
 still richer bloom to the heavenly grace ! The 
 Lord will not only give us a heart of compassion ; 
 it shall be compassion rid of all brusqueness ; 
 it shall also be purged of all superciliousness 
 and pride ! It shall be " humbleminded." 
 Even pity may wear some of the garments 
 of pride ! There is something bitter and 
 offensive in all compassion which moves in 
 patronage. The Man whose "compassions 
 failed not" was "meek and lowly in heart!" 
 
132 THE FIEST EPISTLE OP PETER 
 
 Pity is petrifying when it conies from pride ; it 
 is soothing and healing when it flows from the 
 humble mind, and this is the perfected grace of 
 the sanctified life. 
 Verse 9 " ^ot rendering evil for evil, or reviling for 
 reviling; but contrariwise blessing." Surely that 
 is the perfection of compassion ! Compassion 
 may go out on chivalrous errands with sensitive 
 hands and lowly mind, and may meet with 
 ingratitude and angry rebuff from those whom 
 she seeks to serve. When the one we have 
 been compassionately nursing turns and reviles 
 us, and treats 0ur ministry with contempt, how 
 easy it is to become sour and hard, to return 
 reviling for reviling, and to throw up the 
 knightly service with disgust! But the Lord 
 will so perfect the compassion that even in the 
 midst of reviling it will continue in '^ blessing," 
 and in atmospheres of ingratitude and contempt 
 will toil on in the ministry of "healing them 
 that are bruised." What say you now to these 
 softer graces, these riper fruits of the sanctified 
 life ? Are they not a resplendent issue ? He 
 who continually, in his heart, sanctifies Christ 
 as Lord, becomes possessed by a compassion 
 which moves in delicate sensitiveness, and in 
 humblemindedness, and which remains sweet 
 and persistent in hostile atmospheres of mur- 
 muring and contempt. 
 
CHAPTER III. 8-15 133 
 
 Now let us turn to the sterner products of 
 the sanctified life. Let us turn to the hearts- 
 of-oak of which the softer graces are the per- 
 fected fruit. Let us contemplate the severer 
 virtues, the more commanding strength. 
 
 ^^ Zealous of that which is good" That sounds verse 13 
 suggestive of strength ! " Clarify your concep- 
 tion of duty ! Get it clearly in your eye ! Set 
 the good firmly before you ! Then be zealous ! " 
 Such is the strong, definite virtue which is the 
 fruit of the sanctified life. " Zealous of the 
 good ! " You will get the native energy of the 
 word " zealous " if you recall its kinsman 
 " jealous." It is significant of consuming eager- 
 ness and ceaseless vigilance. It is suggestive 
 of burning passion. There towers the '* good ! '' 
 The " zealous " soul confronts it, not with faint 
 and timid aspiration, but possessed by a blazing 
 and driving ambition ! The strength of his 
 passion is the measure of his defence. You may 
 play tricks with a candle-flame ; you must give 
 margin to a bonfire. You may trifle with the 
 lukewarm ; who would try it on with the 
 zealot ? You may carry an evil suggestion to 
 one man, and quite unembarrassed you may lay 
 it across the threshold of his mind. You may 
 take the suggestion to another man, and before 
 you have got out of the preface you are scorched 
 and consumed. There are lives so sanctified by 
 
134 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the indwelling Christ that they blight all evil 
 approaches, and cause them to wither away. 
 Their iire is their defence. That is a wonderful 
 figure employed by the prophet—" clad with 
 zeal as a cloak." The man wears a protective 
 garment of fire ! He is secured in his own 
 enthusiasms ! He is preserved in the spirit of 
 burning. Now, that burning passion for " that 
 which is good" is one of the strengths of the 
 sanctified life. Why, our very word " enthusi- 
 asm," which is now suggestive of ardour, passion, 
 fire, had no such significance in its earliest day. 
 It literally signifies " in God," and it is because 
 men have found that souls which are united 
 with God are characterised by zeal and fire, that 
 the word has lost its causal content, and is now 
 limited to the description of the effect. The 
 enthusiastic is the fiery, but fiery because in 
 fellowship with God. "He shall baptize . . ; 
 with fire." One of the resultant virtues of 
 sanctification is spiritual enthusiasm, a zeal for 
 " that which is good." 
 Verse 14 " Suffering for righteousness' saJce.^^ That 
 sounds like a masculine virtue ! It is a phrase 
 which unveils a little more of the firm strength 
 of this spiritual ambition! The zealot goes 
 right on, with "the good" as his goal, suffer- 
 ing loss, if need be, of ease and comfort and 
 wealth and fame, and counting the loss as 
 
CHAPTEE III. 8-15 135 
 
 ^^ blessed'^ if only it help him in the way of 
 spiritual attainment. This is the character of 
 spiritual enthusiasts! "We may reserve for 
 such character whatever criticism we please, 
 we cannot deny it the eulogium of " strength." 
 At any rate it is not weak and effeminate. 
 There is something about it granitic and 
 majestic ! Christ Jesus makes men and women 
 who despise ease, who are " ready to be offered," 
 who will plod through toils and pains and 
 martyrdom if these lie in the way of duty 
 and truth. Only a few months ago our 
 little chapels outside Pekin were destroyed by 
 the Boxers, and the majority of the native 
 Christians foully murdered. The chapels are 
 being erected again. I have read the account 
 of the opening of one of these restored 
 sanctuaries. And who took part in the re- 
 opening ? The remnant of the decimated 
 church! Men stood there whose wives and 
 children had been butchered in the awful 
 carnival ; there they stood, their love undimmed, 
 their faith unshaken, themselves " ready to be 
 offered " in their devotion to the Lord ! I say, 
 give to it any criticism you please, you cannot 
 deprive it of the glory of superlative strength ! 
 '' They rejoiced that they were counted worthy 
 to suffer shame for His name." That is the 
 product of the sanctified life. The Lord lifts us 
 
136 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 above the common fear. See how the passage 
 Verse 14 proceeds : ^^ And fear not their fear ^ neither he 
 troubled^' That is the characteristic which is 
 even now shining resplendently in the lives of 
 the native Christians in China. They have been 
 gloriously delivered from common fear and 
 distraction. They are fearless and collected, 
 quietly prepared to " suffer for righteousness' 
 saLe," and stropgly holding on the way of life, 
 " zealous of that which is good." " Unto them 
 it is given on the behalf of Christ, not only 
 to believe in His name, but also to suffer for 
 His sake." 
 
 Now, let me sum up my exposition. The 
 fruits of the sanctified life are to be found in 
 the tender graces and in commanding virtues, in 
 compassion, sensitive and humbleminded, and 
 in moral and spiritual enthusiasm which is 
 perfectly devoid of fear. Now, do you not 
 think that where these soft compassions flow 
 and these sterner virtues dwell— river and rock 
 Verse 15 — a man will be able to " give answer to every 
 man that asketh a reason concerning the hope that 
 is in him " ? The finest reason a man can 
 give for a spiritual hope is a spiritual experience. 
 What have I seen, and heard, and felt, and 
 known? In these experiences I shall find 
 invincible reasons in days of inquiry and con- 
 troversy. If a man has sanctified in his heart 
 
CHAPTEE III. 8-15 137 
 
 Christ as Lord, and discovers that his hardness 
 has been softened into gracious sympathies, that 
 his coldness towards the right has been changed 
 into passionate enthusiasm, and that his 
 trembling timidities have given place to firm 
 and fruitful fearlessness, has he not a splendid 
 answer to give to every man who asketh him a 
 reason concerning the hope that is in him? 
 The answer does not peep out in an apologetic 
 '' perhaps " or a trembling " if " ; it is a mas- 
 culine " verily," a confident " I know." As to 
 the issues of such an answer the apostle is clear. 
 A vital testimony is invincible. Fine living is 
 not only a fine argument, it is the only ejffective 
 silencer of bad men. " They will be put to 
 shame who revile your good manner of life in 
 " Christ." Men may more than match you in 
 subtlety of argument. In intellectual con- 
 troversy you may suifer an easy defeat. But 
 the argument of a redeemed life is unassailable. 
 "Seeing the man that was healed standing 
 with them, they could say nothing against it." 
 
BRINGING US TO GOD 
 
 1 Peter iii. 18-22 
 
 Christ also sufered for sins once, the righteous for the 
 unrighteous, that He might bring us to God ; being put to 
 death in the Jksh, but quickened in the spirit; in which 
 also He went and preached unto the spirits in prison, which 
 aforetime were disobedient, when the lon^sufferi7ig of God 
 waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a pre- 
 paring, wherein few, that is, eight souls, were saved through 
 water : which also after a true likeness doth now save yoUj 
 even baptism, not the putting away of the filth of the Jleshy 
 but the interrogation of a good conscience toward God^ 
 through the resurrection of Jesus Christ ; who is on the 
 right hand of God, having gone into heaven ; angels and 
 authorities and powers being made subject unto Him. 
 
 The concluding passage of this great chapter 
 is like a landscape in the uncertain light of the 
 early morning. Here and there the black 
 shadows still linger and prolong the night. The 
 hollows are filled with mist. A prevailing 
 dimness possesses the scene. From only a few 
 things has the veil dropped, and their lineaments 
 are seen in suggestive outline. On the whole, 
 we are dealing with obscure hints, with partial 
 unveilings, which awaken wonder, rather than 
 convey enlightenment. Perhaps, in the present 
 
 138 
 
CHAPTER III. 18-22 139 
 
 stage of our pilgrimage, an open-eyed wonder is 
 more fruitful than an assurance begotten of 
 broader light. Assurance may nourish sluggish- 
 ness ; an expectant wonder disciplines the powers 
 to a rare perceptiveness. But amid aU the 
 indefiniteness of the revelation, there are two 
 or three visions which are sufficiently clear to 
 enrich our thought and life. We have glimpses 
 of the Lord in a threefold activity. We see 
 Him engaged in His redemptive work among 
 men upon earth: ^'•Christ also suffered for sins ^erse IS 
 once, the righteous for the unrighteous, that Re 
 might bring us to God.'^ We behold Him 
 ministering to spirits who have left the sphere 
 of earth, but who are not yet in reconciled 
 fellowship with their God. " He went and Verse 19 
 preached unto the spirits in prison.'^ And we see 
 Him again on the throne of His glory receiving 
 the willing and jubilant homage of the mystic 
 powers who surround the sovereignty of God. 
 ^^ He is on the right hand of God . . . angels and Verse 22 
 authorities and powers being made subject unto 
 HimJ^ Let us contemplate these three rela- 
 tionships. ' 
 
 " Christ also suffered for sins once." There Verse 18 
 is a reference to some distinct and definite 
 historical event. To the apostle there was a 
 certain nameable season when our redemption 
 was achieved. The sufferings of the Master 
 
140 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 were infinitely more than momentary incidents, 
 reflecting the permanent mood of God. Christ's 
 sufferings were altogether unique. They were 
 paralleled by no previous happenings, and they 
 would never be repeated. " Christ suffered for 
 sins once"; something was done, done "once," 
 and done for ever. Therefore, Gethsemane and 
 Calvary are gravely and uniquely significant. 
 They are more than the tempestuous ending 
 of a noble and laborious life. Behind their 
 appalling externalities there are more appalling 
 conditions. Behind the loneliness of the garden 
 there is the more awful loneliness of the soul. 
 Behind the blackness of Calvary there is the 
 deeper darkness of the spirit. The real move- 
 ments of redemptive ministry are not to be 
 witnessed in the material setting of the Cruci- 
 fixion. The human and material environment of 
 the Master's death has dominated our thought too 
 much. I do not think that the material incidents 
 of Gethsemane and Calvary were essential to 
 our redemption. I believe that if Christ had 
 never been betrayed by one of the twelve. He 
 would still have died for our sins. I believe 
 that if He had never suffered the brutal ac- 
 companiments of mockery and blasphemy, and 
 the loathsome coarseness of contemptible men, 
 He would still have died for our sins. I believe 
 that if He had never been crucified, He would 
 
CHAPTER III. 18-22 141 
 
 still have died for our sins. I believe that if 
 He had finished His ministry in public acclama- 
 tion, instead of public contempt, He would still 
 have passed into outer darkness, into an un- 
 thinkable loneliness, into a terrible midnight of 
 spiritual forsakenness and abandonment. He 
 came to die, came to pass into the night which 
 is " the wages of sin," and what we men did 
 was to add to His death the pangs of contempt 
 and crucifixion. 
 
 '* Christ suffered for sins once." But could not 
 sin have been forgiven without the sufferings ? 
 Could not sin have been forgiven without 
 abandonment ? Might we not have had our 
 forgiveness without that cry of " forsaken " ? 
 I ask these questions not because I can answer 
 them, but in order to awake a reverent wonder 
 and a fruitful awe. This I know, that cheap 
 forgiveness always lightens sin. Flippant for- 
 giveness gilds the sin it forgives, and the sorest 
 injury we can do to any man is to lighten his 
 conception of the enormity of sin. The only 
 really healthy forgiveness is the forgiveness 
 which pardons sin while at the same time it 
 reveals it. This, at any rate, is one of the 
 commanding glories of evangelical religion — it 
 never makes light of sin. Nowhere does for- 
 giveness shine more resplendently, and nowhere 
 does sin gloom more repulsively, than in the 
 
142 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 redemptive love of Christ. In that love we 
 behold both the horrors of the midnight and 
 the quiet, sunny glories of the noontide. " Christ 
 suffered for sins once," in order that sin might 
 never be glozed and veneered. In obtaining our 
 forgiveness by His death, the Lord Christ re- 
 vealed His love and unveiled our sin. 
 Verse 18 " Christ suffered for sins . . . that He might 
 hring us to God.^^ By the power of His re- 
 demption we can make our way home. He 
 is " the way " ; the road has been opened for 
 us by the ministry of His grace. He is the 
 *' truth " ; in His redemption truth was not 
 dimmed but glorified. He is " the life " ; in His 
 grace are to be found all the resources for 
 raising the dead into the renewed and glorified 
 estate of children of God. He suffered, "that 
 He might bring us to God." All that need be 
 said about that gracious " bringing " is just this, 
 that in Jesus, answering the call of His redeem- 
 ing grace, men and women in countless numbers 
 have turned their faces home, and are making 
 their way out of the deadening bondage of sin 
 into the ''glorious liberty of the children of 
 God." 
 
 Far, far away, like bells at evening pealing, 
 The voice of Jesus sounds o'er land and sea ; 
 
 And laden souls, by thousands meekly stealing. 
 Kind Shepherd, turn their weary steps to Thee. 
 
CHAPTER III. 18-22 143 
 
 And now the sphere of our vision is 
 changed. Our minds are turned to another 
 aspect of the saving ministry of Christ. The 
 Saviour has died. " The great transaction 's 
 done." He has suffered for sins '* once." For- 
 giveness is offered to all. What of those 
 who have departed this life, and have never 
 heard the news of the great redemption ? Men 
 have sinned against their light, they have 
 revolted against the Master. But they have 
 lacked the unspeakable advantage of hearing 
 the story of redemptive love. Are they to have 
 no chance ? The souls '* tvhich aforetime ivere Verse 2C 
 disobedient . . , in the days of Noah^^^ are they 
 to suffer for their disobedience, deprived al- 
 together of the ministry of Christ's redemption ? 
 Let the question be stated with perfect frank- 
 ness — are the sinful, who have never heard 
 of Jesus, to pass into the darkness of a 
 final destiny, a darkness which will never be 
 illumined by the gospel and ministry of re- 
 demption ? Here is the scriptural answer to 
 that painful quest : ^'' He went and 'preached unto Verse lo 
 the spirits in prison.^' I know we are dealing 
 with dim hints, and not with bright revelations, 
 but from those words one thing is clear to me, 
 that final judgment is not to be pronounced on 
 any until they have heard of the redemptive love 
 of Jesus, and have had the offer and opportunity 
 
144 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 of accepting it. No man's destiny is to be fixed 
 until he has heard of Christ. The " spirits in 
 prison," who have not heard the gospel of 
 redemption, are to hear it in their prison-house 
 and are to have the gracious offer which is 
 made to you and me to-day. I know the objec- 
 tion which is taken to this interpretation. It 
 is said to weaken the urgency of foreign 
 missions, to make men sluggish in the labour of 
 taking the gospel of light to unillumined tribes 
 and peoples. If the offer of salvation is to be 
 made to the ignorant on the other side of death, 
 what special urgency is there for strenuous 
 labour in the present ? That is how many men 
 have reasoned, and how many reason to-day. If 
 the unenlightened heathen are not swept into 
 hell, the burden of the situation is lightened, 
 and the strain is relaxed. It is a terrific motive 
 to conceive that the unillumined multitudes are 
 dropping over the precipice of death into ever- 
 lasting torment. And that has been the con- 
 ception of many devoted followers of Christ. 
 I was reading a book the other day in which 
 the writer made the terrible declaration that 
 three millions of the heathen and Mohammedans 
 are dying every month, dropping over the 
 precipice into the awful night, swept into 
 eternity ! Swept into what ? If they go out 
 with unlit minds and hearts, are they never 
 
CHAPTER III. 18-22 145 
 
 to see the gracious countenance of the Light of 
 Life ? "He went and preached unto the spirits 
 in prison." Again I ask, does this destroy the 
 urgency of foreign missions, and will it lull the 
 heart of the Church to sleep? Where are 
 we if the motive of our missions and ministry 
 is to save people from the fires of hell ? 
 Apart altogether from salvation from torment, 
 is the Master Himself worth knowing? Sup- 
 posing we could now be assured that every 
 soul in the heathen world would be here- 
 after rescued from the torments of hell, is there 
 nothing in our Gospel which shapes itself into 
 an urgent and all-constraining evangel ? Seek 
 out some ripe old saint, who has deep and in- 
 timate intercourse with the Lord ; let her open 
 her heart to you about the glories of her faith ; 
 and you will discover that the word " hell " has 
 dropped out of her vocabulary. She is so ab- 
 sorbed in the glories of her Lord, so possessed 
 by the delights of daily companionship, so en- 
 gaged in carrying her own God-given comfort 
 to the sorrows of others, that the house of 
 torments has no place in her heart. If you ask 
 her the nature of the evangel she carries about 
 with her, this will be her reply: 
 
 God only knows the love of God, 
 Oh that it now were shed abroad 
 In every human heart! 
 
146 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 The real missionary motive is not to save 
 from hell, but to reveal the Christ ; not to 
 save from a peril, but to proclaim and create 
 a glorious companionship. Here is the marrow 
 of the controversy, concentrated into one 
 pressing question : 7s it of infinite moment to 
 know Christ now? Assume that there are 
 now men and women in the heathen world 
 who are to remain upon the earth for the next 
 twenty years, and it is in our power to make 
 those twenty years a season of hallowed fellow- 
 ship with the Lord, is it worth the doing? 
 Even further assuming that if they pass 
 through death unenlightened, they will hear 
 the message of reconciliation in the beyond, 
 is it worth our while to light up those 
 twenty years with the gracious light of re- 
 demptive grace ? What is the money-value 
 of an hour with the Lord? I do not address 
 my question to the unredeemed, for the unre- 
 deemed have no answer, and in them the 
 missionary-motive has no place. I speak to 
 those who have accepted the offer of reconciling 
 love, and who know the power of the Lord's 
 salvation, and of them I ask — "What is the 
 money-value of an hour with the Lord ? 
 " Beyond all knowledge and all thought.'^ 
 Carry your values across to the regions of 
 ignorance and night. To be able to give ond 
 
CHAPTER III. 18-22 147 
 
 " day of the Son of Man " to some poor old soul 
 in heathendom : to lighten one day's load ; to 
 transfigure one day's sorrow ; to lift the burden 
 of his passion ; to create a river of kindliness ; 
 to light his lamp in the evening-time, and to 
 send him through the shadows in the assurance 
 of immortal hope, — is it worth the doing ? "A 
 day in Thy courts is better than a thousand." 
 Such is the value of a day with the Lord. We 
 are stewards of the mysteries of grace. Because 
 we have them we owe them. Woe be to us if 
 through our thoughtlessness we leave our fellow- 
 men in days of burdensome terror and night, 
 when by our ministry we might have led them 
 into the peace and liberty of the children 
 of light. 
 
 And now the sphere of the Lord's activity 
 is again changed. The apostle next turns our 
 minds to the Lord's enthronement and dominion. 
 He " ^s on the right hand of God^ having gone Verse 22 
 into heaven; angels and authorities and 'powers 
 being made subject unto HimJ^ I need that 
 conception of the Christ! I know Him as a 
 Sufferer, despised and lonely, sharing our 
 frailties, and hastening on to death. I know 
 Him as " a Man of Sorrows and acquainted with 
 grief." I need to know Him as the risen and 
 glorified King, moving in supreme exaltations, 
 receiving the glad and reverent homage of 
 
148 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 " the spirits that surround the throne." I have 
 seen Him weep ; I have seen Him wearied at 
 the well ; I have heard Him cry ** I thirst " ; 
 I have heard the still more awful cry "For- 
 saken ! " Now I would see Him, " with a name 
 above every name," highly exalted," " angels and 
 authorities and powers being made subject unto 
 Him." We are timid, and nerveless, and hope- 
 less, lacking in spiritual energy and persist- 
 ence, crawling in reluctance when we ought 
 to speed like conquerors, and all because we 
 do not realise the majestic lordship of our King. 
 " All power is given unto Me in heaven and on 
 earth." What kind of followers ought that to 
 create? Surely it ought to be creative of 
 disciples who can "strongly live and nobly 
 strive." Soldiers will dare anything when they 
 have confidence in the strength and wisdom of 
 their general. His commands are their possi- 
 bilities, and they are eager to turn them into 
 sure achievements. We have a brave Captain, 
 seated upon the throne, and exercising universal 
 sovereignty. Surely we ought to march in the 
 spirit of assured conquest. We ought to attack 
 every stronghold of sin with confidence, as 
 though the dark citadel were already falling 
 into ruin. The Lord wishes His disciples to 
 begin all enterprises in the knowledge that 
 victory is secured. " Believe that ye receive 
 
CHAPTER III. 18-22 149 
 
 them and ye shall have them.'^ That is the 
 spirit of victory. 
 
 All this redemptive power may become ours 
 by baptism, but not the baptism that consists 
 in any outward sprinkling of external cleansing. 
 "Not by the putting away of the filth of the 
 flesh." We need to be lifted above the filth 
 of the spirit, and so the baptism must be an 
 inspiration. There must be poured into our 
 life rivers of energy from the risen Lord. 
 
 That cleansing flood will create within us 
 moral soundness. "We shall attain unto " a good 
 conscience." Our lives will be set in " interroga- 
 tion toward God." Our souls will be possessed 
 by a reverent inquisitiveness, and they will be 
 over searching among the deep things of God. 
 
THE SUFFEEING WHICH MEANS 
 TEIUMPH 
 
 1 Peter iv. 1-6 
 
 Forasmuch then as Christ suffered in the jksh^ arm 
 ye yourselves also with the same mind ; for he that hath 
 suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin ; that ye no 
 longer should live the rest of your time in the flesh to the 
 lusts of men, but to the will of God. For the time past may 
 suffice to have wrought the desire of the Gentiles, and to 
 have walked in lasciviousness, lusts, ivinehihhings, revellings, 
 carousings, and abominable idolati^ies : wherein they think 
 it strange that ye run not with them into the sarae excess of riot, 
 speakiTig evil of you : who shall give account to Him that is 
 ready to judge the quick and the dead. For unto this end 
 was the gospel preached even to the dead, that they 
 might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live 
 according to God in the spirit. 
 
 Verse 1 ''Forasmuch then as Christ suffered in the flesh J ^ 
 Do not let us so think of the sufferings of 
 Christ as to relegate them to the last few 
 days of His earthly ministry. It is well to 
 confine the great term, " the passion," to the 
 awful events of Gethsemane and Calvary. In 
 the midnight of the latter days the happenings 
 are unspeakable. On Calvary the sufferings 
 not only culminate; they become unique. 
 
 150 
 
CHAPTEH IV. 1-6 151 
 
 They detach themselves from the common lot, 
 
 and pass into the pangs of a lonely and terrible 
 
 isolation whose supreme bitterness cannot be 
 
 shared. 
 
 We may not know, we cannot tell 
 What pains He had to bear. 
 
 It is well to mark these appalling hours by the 
 distinctive term, *' the passion." But we must not 
 allow "the passion" to eclipse the sufferings of the 
 earlier days. Christ always " suffered in the 
 flesh." The streak of blood lay like a red track 
 across the years. The marks of sacrifice were 
 everywhere pronounced. What occasioned the 
 common sufferings ? Here is the explanation. 
 His life was dominated by a supreme thought ; 
 it was controlled by an all-commanding pur- 
 pose. "What was the purpose ? What was the 
 prevailing characteristic of His mind? "I do 
 always those things that please Him." He has 
 translated that purpose of obedience into 
 counsel for His disciples : '^ Seek ye first the 
 kingdom of God and His righteousness." That 
 was the mind of the Master. He made his 
 abode in the unseen. He sought His gratifica- 
 tions in the eternal. He rejected the sove- 
 reignty of the flesh. He subordinated the 
 temporal. He uncrowned the body, making it 
 a common subject, and compelling it into 
 obeisance to high commands. In all the 
 
162 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETEK 
 
 competing alternatives that presented them- 
 selves, priority was given to the spiritual. The 
 allurements of ease, the piquant flavours of 
 pleasurable sensations, the feverish delights of 
 passion, the delicious thrill of popular acclama- 
 tion, the sweetness of immediate triumph: all 
 these many and varied offspring of the temporal 
 were not permitted to be regnant; they were 
 not allowed to usurp the place of executive 
 and determining forces ; they were muzzled 
 and restrained, and kept to the rear of the life. 
 Christ looked " not at the things which are 
 seen, but at the things which are not seen." 
 Such was the mind of the Master. 
 
 Now, emphasis of this kind inevitably neces- 
 sitates suffering. No man can give pre-emi- 
 nence to the unseen without the shedding of 
 blood. When the immediate contends with the 
 apparently remote, the immediate is so urgently 
 obtrasive that to hold it down entails a cruci- 
 fixion. When carnality contends with con- 
 science, the healthy settling of the contention 
 necessitates suffering. When ease opposes 
 duty, the putting down of the fascinating 
 enemy necessitates suffering. When mere 
 sharpness comes into conflict with truth, when 
 money seeks to usurp the throne of righteous- 
 ness, when the glitter of immediate success 
 ranges itself against the fixed and glorious 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 1-6 153 
 
 constellation of holiness, the controversies will 
 not be settled in bloodless reveries and in 
 unexhausting dreams. To put down the imme- 
 diate and to prefer the remote, to subject the 
 temporal and to choose the eternal, demands 
 a continual crucifixion. '^ Christ also suffered, 
 being tempted." Alternatives were presented 
 to Him, and the preference occasioned the 
 shedding of blood. Christ suffered, being 
 tempted! The temptations were not bloodless 
 probings of the invulnerable air. They were 
 searching appeals to vital susceptibilities, and 
 resistance was pain. " Christ also suffered in 
 the flesh." All through the years He had been 
 exercising the higher choice. Before He 
 emerged into the public gaze, in the obscure 
 years at Nazareth, in His early youth in the 
 village, in the social life of the community, in 
 the little affairs of the carpenter's shop, He 
 had been denying Himself and taking up His 
 cross. He had preferred the eternal to the 
 temporal, and His clear, commanding con- 
 science had dominated the clamours of the flesh. 
 This was the emphasis of the Master's life ; 
 He " suffered in the flesh." Now such emphasis 
 spells sinlessness. When the eternal rules the 
 temporal, when the remotely glorious is pre- 
 ferred before the immediately bewitching, when 
 suffering is chosen before the violation of the 
 
154 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 moral and spiritual ideal, the soul is already 
 wearing the crown of the sinless life. 
 
 Verse 1 " He that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased 
 from sin.'" And now the apostle takes up the 
 example of the Master and makes it a motive in 
 the life of the disciple. '' Forasmuch then as 
 Christ suffered in the flesh, arm ye yourselves 
 alsoioith the same mindJ^ What was His mind ? 
 The preference and the predominance of the 
 eternal. "Arm yourselves with the same 
 mind." Let the same governing purpose deter- 
 mine the choices in your life. In every moment 
 of the little , day let the eternal rule. " No 
 
 Verse 2 longer live the rest of your time in the flesh.'' 
 Don't let the flesh constitute the entire circle 
 of your movement! Don't let the temporal 
 define the boundaries of your journeyings! 
 Launch out upon larger waters ! Live no 
 longer "^o the lusts of men." Don't follow the 
 feverish will-o'-the-wisps that flit about the 
 swamps! But live ^^ to the will of God.'' 
 Follow the eternal star! Let the spiritual 
 control aU the events in your life, both great 
 and smaU, just as the force of gravitation 
 dominates alike the swinging planet and the 
 mote that sports in the sunbeam. Such a 
 sovereign purpose will necessitate suffering, 
 but the purpose will of itself provide the 
 
 Verse 1 necessary defence, " Arm ye yourselves also 
 
CHAPTER IV. 1-6 155 
 
 with the same mind." The exalted purpose will 
 be our armour, our assurance against destruc- 
 tion. If we are wounded, in the wounds there 
 shall be no poison. If we suffer, in the suffer- 
 ings there shall be no disease. In the combat 
 there shall be no fatality. We are " armed " 
 against destructive hurt. " What shall harm 
 us if we be followers of that which is good ? " 
 "As dying, yet shall we live." " Our light 
 affliction . . . worketh for us a weight of 
 glory." " Forasmuch then as Christ suffered 
 in the flesh, arm ye yourselves also with the 
 same mind." 
 
 From the contemplation of the Master's 
 '' sufferings in the flesh " the apostle now turns 
 the minds of his readers to the contemplation 
 of their own yesterdays, if perchance they may 
 find in the retrospect an added force to con- 
 strain them to a life of triumphant suffering. 
 He has sought to allure them to exalted, spiritual 
 living by the example of the Lord; now he 
 will seek to drive them into the same lofty 
 tendency by causing them to dwell upon their 
 own loathsome and appalling past. The re- 
 pulsion obtained from our yesterdays will 
 give impetus to the inclination to live " to 
 the will of God " to-day. " For the time past Verse 3 
 may suffice to have wrought the desire of the 
 Gentiles, and to have walked in lasciviousnesa^ 
 
156 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 lusts ^ winebibbings^ revellingSj carousingSj and 
 abominable idolatries.^' What an appalling list ! 
 And how plainly worded ! Surely a list like 
 that will add the force of recoil to the newty- 
 born inclination towards God ! It is a fruitful 
 exercise to go into our yesterdays, and quietly 
 meditate upon " our times past." It is a 
 humbling and painful ministry to trace the face 
 of the past, bit by bit, feature by feature, giving 
 to each characteristic its own plain and legiti- 
 mate name. The Apostle Paul frequently em- 
 ployed this ministry when writing to his 
 converts. He would never allow them to forget 
 their yesterdays, lest they should lose the 
 impetus that comes from the retrospect. " And 
 such were some of you." There you have a 
 retrospective glance. What had they been? 
 *' Fornicators, adulterers, effeminate, thieves, 
 covetous, drunkards, revilers, extortioners." 
 How black the catalogue! "And such were 
 some of you." I think the reminder would send 
 the converts to their knees in intenser supplica- 
 tion. Hear the apostle again in his letter to 
 the Ephesians: "In time past ye walked ac- 
 cording to the course of this world, according 
 to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit 
 that now worketh in the children of dis- 
 obedience." I say he will not suffer the past 
 to be eclipsed and forgotteii, He lifts the veil, 
 
CHAPTER IV. 1-6 157 
 
 and pointedly describes the terrible scene. 
 And here is the Apostle Peter seeking to con- 
 firm his readers' devotion by the power of a 
 repulsion, and he turns their minds to ^' the 
 times past." It is a rare ministry for the 
 creation of sincere and agonising prayer ! A 
 man may pray, " Lead, kindly Light," and in 
 in the utterance there may be "no agony and 
 bloody sweat." If he turn his face to the 
 past, the burden of his yesterdays may crush 
 out of his heart a prayer which is more a 
 moaning cry than an articulate speech. 
 
 I was not ever thus, nor prayed that Thou 
 
 Shouldst lead me on. 
 I loved to choose and see my path, but now 
 
 Lead Thou me on ! 
 I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears 
 Pride ruled my will : remember not past years. 
 
 That last prayer is just the cry of an aching 
 and broken heart! The retrospect made him 
 a humble and wrestling suppliant. That is the 
 motive of the apostle in reminding his readers 
 of "the times past" in their lives. He longed 
 to corroborate their new-born spirituality by 
 the rebound acquired from the contemplation of 
 their own past. " I thought over my ways, and 
 turned my feet unto Thy testimonies." 
 
 Now, let us assume that a man has become 
 *' armed with the mind" of Christ, that his 
 
158 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 own wasted past gives impetus to his renewed 
 present, that lie will pay homage to the eternal 
 even at the cost of immediate suffering; 
 what will be the influence of such a life upon 
 the world? Assume that the "unseen and 
 eternal" receives the emphasis, that the tem- 
 poral is denied at all costs if it conflict with 
 the eternal, how will such a life of mingled 
 restraint and loftiness affect the world ? Here 
 Verse 4 is the answer. " They think it strange that ye 
 run not with them into the same excess of riot.'' 
 "They think it strange!" They are arrested 
 in wonder ! What is the significance of this ? 
 That we shall startle the world by our 
 Puritanism. We " run not with them into the 
 same excess of riot." They are astounded! 
 Puritanism is arresting. Do not let us be 
 ashamed of the old word. Puritanism is most 
 vigorously denounced where it is least under- 
 stood. We need to get back the commanding 
 characteristics of its life. We need to recover 
 its broad principles, but not its particular and 
 detailed application. I speak not now of the 
 counterfeit Puritanism which expressed itself 
 in loud and eccentric externahsms, and in much- 
 flaunted and seH-advertised piety and self- 
 denial. There is the Puritan described by Lord 
 Macaulay, who was distinguished from other 
 men by " his gait, his garb, his lank hair, the 
 
CHAPTER IV. 1-6 159 
 
 sour solemnity of Hs face, tlie upturned white 
 of bis eyes, his nasal twang, and his peculiar 
 dialect." That is a Puritanism for which no 
 sane and healthy man desires a resurrection. 
 But there is the Puritanism which Longfellow 
 portrays in Miles Standish ; there is the 
 Puritanism of John Milton, in whose poetry 
 we touch the very heart and spirit of the great 
 awakening. What, then, is the characteristic 
 ideal of true Puritanism? It is life whose 
 secret springs are governed by the eternal. It 
 is choice of duty before ease, of ideas before 
 sensations, of truth before popularity, of a good 
 conscience before a full purse, of the holy God 
 before dazzling and bewitching Mammon! 
 That is the true Puritanism, and that is the 
 life whose glorious passion arrests the un- 
 restrained and riotous world in sharp and 
 inquisitive wonder. "They think it strange 
 that ye run not with them into the same excess 
 of riot." That sense of wonder may ripen into 
 reverence and may issue in prayer. The con- 
 templation of a fine restraint and an unspotted 
 integrity has often created an uneasiness which 
 has eventually led its victim into the very rest 
 and peace of God. But the world's wonder 
 does not always mature into reverence. Some- 
 times it sours into resentment, and results in 
 a malignity which demands the Puritan's 
 
160 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETEB 
 
 crucifixion. I cannot forget that the men of 
 old wondered at the Master, and then proceeded 
 to His crucifixion. " They think it strange 
 Verse 4 . . . speaJdng evil of you^ They will attribute 
 your restraint to evil motives. The hiding 
 of your benevolence will be interpreted as 
 stinginess; its expression will be regarded as 
 self-advertisement. Your self-denial will be 
 explained as a cloak that conceals a deeper 
 covetousness ; your entire walk will be de- 
 nounced as inspired by Beelzebub, the prince 
 of the devils. In the face of such resentment 
 and reviling what shall the Puritan do ? What 
 says the apostle ? Just go on ! In the face 
 of it all, just calmly persist. Do not return 
 reviling for reviling. Leave them and your- 
 selves to the arbitrament of God. He knows 
 all ! We must all " give account to Him that 
 is ready to judge the quick and the dead." 
 Maintain the emphasis ! Proclaim and exalt 
 the Eternal! Live "not to the lusts of the 
 flesh," but "to the wiU of God." The path 
 of suffering is "the way to glory." And 
 "wisdom shall be justified of her children." 
 
GETTING EEADY FOR THE END 
 
 1 Peter iv. 7-11 
 
 The end of all things is at hand : he ye therefore of 
 sound mind, and be sober unto jirayer : above all things 
 being fervent in your love among yourselves ; for love 
 cover eth a multitude of sins : using hosjntality one to ^/'^ 
 another without murmuring : according as each hath re- 
 ceived a gift, ministering it ammig yourselves, as good 
 stewards of the manifold grace of God; if any man 
 speaketh, speaking as it were oracles of God ; if any man 
 ministereth, ministering as of the strength which God 
 supplieth : that in all things God may be glorified throwjh 
 Jesus Christ, ivhose is the glory and the dominion for ever 
 and ever. Amen. 
 
 That is a most momentous conviction which 
 is expressed in these words : " The end of all Verse 7 
 things is at handJ^ What kind of conduct will 
 it determine, and to what kind of counsel will 
 it lead ? Here is an apostle, deeply possessed 
 by the solemn conviction that the great Con- 
 summation is approaching, that the glorified 
 Christ is returning, that the judgment is im- 
 pending, and that the " end of all things is at 
 hand." In the looming presence of so urgent 
 
 161 11 
 
162 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 and so commanding an event, how will the 
 apostle shape his message ? What kind of 
 counsel will he give to his readers ? What 
 manner of preparation will he constrain them 
 to make ? It matters little or nothing to 
 my pur^^ose that the apostle's anticipations 
 of the second advent were premature, and 
 that the stupendous consummation was de- 
 layed. For you and for me the instructive and 
 all-absorbing conjunction remains the same. 
 Here is the Apostle Peter sharing with his 
 fellow-Christians the expectation of an im- 
 mediate end. The Judge is at the door ! What 
 will be the manner of their behaviour ? If 
 we knew that within a year or two the Master 
 will reappear as the august and sovereign 
 Judge, how ought we to pass the intervening 
 days ? We know, from the letters of the 
 Apostle Paul, how the urgent expectancy in- 
 fluenced many of the early Christians. Some 
 were thrown into panic. Others were despoiled 
 of their spiritual collectedness by the invasion 
 of unreasonable excitement. Others abandoned 
 their ordinary employment, and lapsed into 
 an indolence in which they might find more 
 leisure to wait and watch for the King's ap- 
 pearing. And we know with what severity the 
 apostle denounced these perilous and irrational 
 excesses. " Study to be quiet ai^d to do your 
 
CHAPTER IV. 7-11 163 
 
 own business." " Be not shaken in mind." 
 " We command that with, quietness ye work 
 and eat your own bread." " Let us watch and 
 be sober." All this dangerous sensationalism 
 was combatted and subdued by the cool self- 
 possession of this man's healthy and imperial 
 mind. 
 
 And now here is the Apostle Peter confronted 
 by the same prevailing and insidious inclina- 
 tions. What will be the character of his 
 message ? Let us make the matter directly 
 pertinent to our own condition that we may 
 appreciate the strong, cooling, controlling in- 
 fluence of the apostle's counsel. For us, 
 too, " the end " may be at hand. Death 
 looms on the not-distant horizon. The King 
 is at the gate ! What shall be the nature of 
 our preparations, and the character of our 
 behaviour ? " The end of all things is at hand : 
 be ye therefore of sound mmcZ." Sound mind ! Verse 7 
 Life is to be characterised by reasonableness 
 and sanity. There is to be nothing morbid 
 about our mental state, nothing melancholy 
 or diseased. We are to be mentally ^' sound," 
 emancipated from distraction and panic. We 
 may enter into the content of the descriptive 
 word by watching its usage in our common 
 speech. We are familiar with the phrase *' as 
 sound as a bell," and the usage will act as 
 
164 THE FmsT EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 part-interpreter of the apostle's thought. " Soiinu 
 as a bell ! " There is no break in the metal, 
 no severance in the elements ; it holds together 
 in compact and undivided unity. " Sound 
 mind " ; as sound as a bell ; no break in the 
 mind, no division, no distraction, but a wonder- 
 ful collectedness, issuing in the definite tone 
 of clear and decisive purpose. We are also 
 familiar with another application of the word, 
 as in the us^ge, " sound" and "unsound" meat, 
 where the significance is indicative of health 
 and disease. And this, too, may guide us into 
 the content of the apostle's thought, for when 
 he counsels " sound-mindedness " he unquestion- 
 ably refers to a mental condition which is freed 
 from all morbidity, defilement, taint, and 
 disease. " The end of all things is at hand : 
 be ye therefore of sound mind," delivered on 
 the one hand from the mental distraction that 
 destroys life's music, and on the other hand 
 from the morbid depression which so frequently 
 opens the gate for the invasion of death. 
 Verse 7 ^' ^nd be soberj^ That is the second note of 
 the apostle's counsel. '' And be sober." It is 
 a warning against all kinds of intoxication, 
 but especially against the intoxication of ex- 
 cited and tumultuous emotion. There are stimu- 
 lants other than those of intoxicating drinks; 
 and there is a sensationalism to be found else- 
 
CHAPTER IV. 7-li 165 
 
 where than in carnal gratification. Excessive 
 stimulants may be found in the revival meeting, 
 and men may revel in intoxicated emotionalism 
 even in the sanctuary. Men may "lose their 
 heads " in many more ways than by the excessive 
 imbibing of strong drink. " Be sober." Don't 
 give way to any excitement which will make life 
 grotesque and foolish ! Beware of the sensa- 
 tionalism which is often the minister of sin. 
 "Be sober." It is an appeal for the culture and 
 discipline of emotion. " Be sober unto prayer " ; Verse 7 
 preserve that calmness of life which is consistent 
 with steady aspiration and fruitful supplication ; 
 maintain a quiet "watching unto prayer." 
 Here, then, are two of the features which 
 characterised a life possessed by a healthy 
 expectancy of the Lord's appearing : sound- 
 mindediiess and sobriety. "We are to wait the 
 coming of the King with mind and heart 
 delivered from the distractions of panic, from 
 the taint of corruption, and from a feverish 
 sensationalism which is destructive of the higher 
 ministries of fellowship and prayer. 
 
 And now the apostle proceeds to add a third 
 element to those already mentioned. " Above all Verse 8 
 things being fervent in your love among your- 
 selves.'' To " sound-mindedness " and " sobriety '* 
 he adds the ministry of "love." Now the 
 
1G6 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 apostle is at some pains to make it clear to us 
 what is the quality of this love which should 
 characterise the life which expects the King's 
 appearing. In the first place, it is to be 
 " fervent." Now the significance of our English 
 word "fervour" scarcely unveils to us the 
 contents of the apostle's mind. He did not so 
 much suggest a love that is ardent as a love 
 that is tense. This very word " tense " is almost 
 the original ,word. The love has to be " tense," 
 stretched out, extended to the utmost limit of a 
 grand comprehensiveness. The New Testament 
 recognises different types and qualities of love, 
 and there is no counsel in which it is more 
 abounding than just in this counsel to push 
 back the boundaries of a circumscribed affection 
 so that it be characterised by a more spacious 
 inclusiveness. There is love whose measure is 
 that of an umbrella. There is love whose in- 
 clusiveness is that of a great marquee. And 
 there is love whose comprehension is that of 
 the immeasurable sky. The aim of the New 
 Testament is the conversion of the umbrella 
 into a tent, and the merging of the tent into the 
 glorious canopy of the all-enfolding heavens. 
 Therefore does the writer of this very letter, in 
 a second letter which he has written, give this 
 very suggestive counsel, " add to brotherly love, 
 love." "Which just means this : make your love 
 
CHAPTER IV. 7-11 167 
 
 more tense ; push back the walls of family love 
 until they include the neighbour ; again push 
 back the walls until they include the stranger ; 
 again push back the walls until they comprehend 
 the foe. The quality of our love is determined 
 by its inclusiveness. At the one extreme there 
 is self-love ; at the other extreme there is philan- 
 thropy ! What is the " tense," the stretch of 
 my love ? What is its covering power ? I do 
 not wonder that the apostle proceeds to indicate 
 the magnificent " cover " afforded by a magnifi- 
 cent love. " Love covereih a multitude of sins^ verse 8 
 Not the sins of the lover, but the sins of the 
 loved ! Love is willing to forget as well as to 
 forgive! Love does not keep hinting at past 
 failures and past revolts. Love is willing to 
 hide them in a nameless grave. When a man, 
 whose life has been stained and blackened by 
 " a multitude of sins," turns over a new leaf, 
 love will never hint at the old leaf, but will 
 rather seek to cover it in deep and healing 
 oblivion. Love is so busy unveiling the promises 
 and allurements of the morrow, that she has 
 little time, and still less desire to stir up 
 the choking dust on the blasted and desolate 
 fields of yesterday. '^ Then drew near unto Him 
 all the publicans and sinners." There's a 
 ''cover" for you! "And behold, a woman in 
 the city, which was a sinner, when she knew . . , 
 
168 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 stood at His feet behind Him weeping ! " There's 
 a cover for you! "The Son of Man is come to 
 seek that which is lost." There's a cover for 
 you ! I do not wonder that the great evangelical 
 prophet of the Old Testament, in heralding the 
 advent of the Saviour, should proclaim Him as 
 " a hiding-place from the wind, a covert from the 
 tempest, as rivers of water in a dry place, and 
 as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." 
 " Love covereth all things." 
 
 But we have not yet done with the apostle's 
 characterisation of the qualities of love. He 
 adds a third word which confirms and enriches 
 the other two. True love, " stretched-out " 
 Verse 9 love, all-sheltering love, " uses hospitality without 
 mur muring. ^^ True love is a splendid host, a 
 veritable Gains in the lavish entertainment 
 which it offers to weary and footsore pilgrims. 
 In the primitive Christian day, the apostolic 
 days, love opened the door and gave hospitality 
 to the itinerant preachers as they went from 
 place to place proclaiming the message of the 
 Cross. Love opened the door to the persecuted 
 refugees, driven from their homesteads because 
 of their devotion to the Lord. There were many 
 of them about, and the love-children were to 
 keep an open door and a sharp look-out, and 
 offer the welcome entertainment. Love is the 
 very genius of hospitality ; it opens the "hospice" 
 
CHAPTER IV. 7-11 169 
 
 in the stormy and perilous heights, and provides 
 a travellers' rest. Wherever love is, the hospice 
 may be found ! " Love never faileth." And 
 the gracious ministry is all discharged so 
 graciously ; " without murmuring ! " There is 
 no frown upon the face, no sense of " put-out- 
 ness " in the attention. It is all done, as 
 Matthew Henry says, "in a kind, easy, hand- 
 some manner," as though the host had been 
 almost impatiently waiting for the privilege, 
 and yearning for its speedy approach. 
 
 Now, brethren, the King is at the gate ! 
 Soon His hand will be upon the latch ! How 
 shall we prepare for Him ? In sound-mindedness, 
 in spiritual sobriety, and in a love which is ever 
 straining after more and more spacious breadth 
 of gracious and generous hospitality. How 
 shall these dispositions express themselves ? 
 AVhat shall be the medium of affection ? What 
 shall be the line of our ministry ? The apostle 
 provides the answer : " According as each hath Verse 10 
 received a gi/V^ We must work through what 
 we have received. " What hast thou that thou 
 hast not received ? " Our members, our senses, 
 our mental aptitudes, our spiritual endowments ! 
 They are all the gifts of the King ! We must 
 use them all in the ministry of love. But 
 beyond all these there is the mysterious and 
 indescribable gift of our own individuality. Wq 
 
170 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 are each, as unique in personality as we are each 
 distinctive in face. Individuality is a unique 
 gift, and is divinely purposed for unique service. 
 We must reverently consecrate our individuality 
 to the King's use, that it may become the 
 Verses minister of His own *' manifold grace " and 
 10, 11 u strength^ In this subordination the individu- 
 ality is preserved intact and unimpaired. Work- 
 ing through us, the Holy Ghost will, shall I say, 
 impinge upon the world in a somewhat different 
 form than from the life of any of our fellows. 
 If an electric current be led through a series of 
 several different materials, its appearance in the 
 outer world will vary with each wire. " In a 
 platinum wire it may appear as light, in an iron 
 one as heat, round a bar of soft iron as magnetic 
 energy, led into a solution as a power that 
 decomposes and recombines." So in many 
 individualities are there " diversities of opera- 
 tions, but the one Spirit." What we have to 
 do is to take our individuality, " according as 
 each hath received the gift," and so reverently 
 consecrate it that " the manifold grace " may 
 work a unique ministry, and by "the strength 
 which God supplieth " we may manifest a daily 
 salvation which shall be to the glory of God. 
 
 Here then, I conclude. I think that no one 
 can be made to stumble by any narrowness and 
 irrelevancy in the apostle's counsel. His com- 
 
CHAPTER IV. 7-11 171 
 
 mandment is exceeding broad. How shall we 
 prepare for the coming of the King? What 
 can be more reasonable than the response I 
 have attempted to expound ? In soimd-minded- 
 ness, in spiritual sobriety, in an affection which 
 is ever seeking greater inclusiveness, and work- 
 ing through the distinctive gifts of the con- 
 secrated individual life. I tell you, if this be 
 my condition, I shall not be afraid "at His 
 coming." He may come in a moment, and very 
 suddenly, in the noontide, or the midnight, or 
 at the cock-crow ; come when He may, I shall 
 "love His appearing." Living calmly, in the 
 atmosphere of affection, and in the mystic 
 strength of consecration, I shall know Him as 
 my friend. The present Bishop of Durham has 
 told us of a beloved friend of his who narrated to 
 him a strangely vivid dream which he had long, 
 long years ago. Let me tell it in the Bishop's 
 words. "Through the bed-chamber window 
 seemed to shine on a sudden an indescribable 
 light ; the dreamer seemed to run, to look ; and 
 there, in the depths above, were beheld three 
 forms. One was unknown, one the Archangel, 
 One the Lord Jesus Christ. And at this most 
 sudden sight that soul, the soul of one over 
 whom, to my knowledge, the unutterable 
 solemnities of the unseen are wont to brood 
 with almost painful power, was instantaneously 
 
172 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 thrilled with a rapturous joy . . . unspeak- 
 able and full of glory: * My Saviour, my 
 Saviour ! ' " 
 
 I pray that when that light breaks upon us, 
 not in the ministry of a dream, but in the 
 veritable coming of the Lord ; when for you 
 and for me " the end of all things is at 
 hand," may we have so brooded on " the 
 solemnities," and so laboured in the gracious 
 ministry of affection, that we too, " when He 
 Cometh," shall be "instantaneously thrilled with 
 raptuous joy, unspeakable and full of glory : 
 * My Saviour, my Saviour ! ' " 
 
THE FIEEY TRIAL 
 
 1 Peter iv. 12-19 
 
 Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial 
 among you^ which coraeth upon you to prove youy as though 
 a strange thing happened unto you : hut insomuch as ye are 
 partakers of Christ's sufferings, rejoice ; that at the revela- 
 tion of His glory also ye may rejoice with exceeding joy. 
 If ye are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are ye; 
 because the Sjnrit of glory and the Spirit of God resteth 
 upon you. For let none of you suffer as a murderer, or a 
 thief or an evil-doer, or as a meddler in other men's matters : 
 hut if a man suffer as a Christian, let him not he ashamed ; 
 hut let him glorify God in this Qiame. For the time is come 
 for judgement to begin at the house of God : and if it begin 
 first at us, what shall be the end of them that obey not the 
 gospel of God ? And if the righteous is scarcely savedy 
 where shall the ungodly and sinner appear? Wherefore 
 let them also that suffer according to the will of God commit 
 their souls in well-doing unto a faithful Creator. 
 
 " The fiery trial among you, which cometh upon Verse 12 
 you to prove you.^^ But is it not one of the 
 perquisites of sainthood to be delivered from 
 suffering? One would have anticipated that 
 part of the inheritance of grace would be 
 freedom from the fiery trial. The flames 
 would never reach us. The enemy would 
 be stayed, and we should sit down in happy 
 173 
 
174 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 quietness at the King's feast ! But this is not 
 the programme of Christianity. Christianity is 
 almost alarmingly daring in the \obtrusive 
 emphasis which it gives to the darl^i elements 
 in its programme. There is no atter^ipt to hide 
 or obscure them. No effort is made to engage 
 our attention to the ''green pastures " and " still 
 waters," and to distract us from the affrighting 
 valley of shadow and gloom. " Whom the Lord 
 loveth He chasteneth." " In the world ye shall 
 have tribulation." " Perfected through suffer- 
 ings." '' Let him take up his cross daily and 
 follow me." ''The fiery trial which is to try 
 you." These are not words which are addressed 
 to " murderers " or " thieves," or " evil-doers," 
 or " busybodies " ; they are quietly spoken to 
 the saints, to men and women whose lives are 
 pledged to virtue, and who are aspiring after 
 the holiness of the perfected life in Christ. 
 
 Then let us just note this : our sufferings do 
 not prove our religion counterfeit. Our many 
 temptations do not throw suspicion on our 
 sonship. Our trials are not the marks of our 
 alienation. Do not let us think that we are 
 strangers because our robes are sometimes 
 stained with our blood. " Think it not strange," 
 says this much-schooled apostle, " Think it not 
 strange ! " Don't think you have never been 
 naturalised — super-naturalised — that you are 
 
CHAPTER IV. 12-19 175 
 
 still a foreigner, an outcast from the home of 
 redemptive grace ! These are the happenings 
 of the home-country ! They are not the marks 
 of foreign rule. They are the signs of paternal 
 government. You are in your Father's house ! 
 God will convert the apparent antagonism into 
 a minister of heavenly grace. The oppressive 
 harrow, as well as the genial sunshine, is part 
 of the equipment needed for the maturing and 
 perfecting of the fruits of the earth. 
 
 What, then, is the purpose of '' the fiery 
 trial " ? What is the meaning of this permitted 
 ministry of suffering ? Well, in the first place, 
 it tests character. It discharges the purpose of 
 an examination. An examination, rightly re- 
 garded, is a vital part of our schooling. It is 
 a minister of revelation. It unfolds our strengths 
 and our weaknesses. And so it is in the larger 
 examination afforded by the discipline of life. 
 Our crises are productive of self-disclosures. 
 They reveal us to ourselves, and I think the 
 revelations are usually creative of grateful 
 surprise. In the midst of the fiery trial we are 
 filled with amazement at the fulness and strength 
 of our resources. When the trial is looming we 
 shrink from it in fear. " We say one to another, 
 " I don't know how I shall bear it ! " And then 
 the crisis comes, and in the midst of the fire 
 we are calm and strong ; and when it is past, 
 
176 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 how frequently we are heard to say, " I never 
 thought I could have gone through it ! " And 
 so " probation worketh hope " ; the heavy 
 discipline is creative of assurance ; the terror 
 becomes the nutriment of our confidence. 
 
 But the fiery trial not only tests by revealing 
 character, it also strengthens and confirms it. 
 Hard trial makes hard and much-enduring 
 muscle. The water that is too soft makes flabby 
 limbs ; it is not creative of bone. And circum- 
 stances which are too soft make no bone : they 
 are productive of character without backbone. 
 Luxuriousness is rarely the cradle of giants. It 
 is not unsuggestive that the soft and bountiful 
 tropics are not the home of the strong, indomi- 
 table, and progressive peoples. The pioneering 
 and progressive races have dwelt in sterner and 
 harder climes. The lap of luxury does not 
 afford the elementary iron for the upbringing 
 of strong and enduring life. Hardness hardens ; 
 antagonism solidifies ; trials innure and confirm. 
 How commonly it has happened that men who, 
 in soft circumstances, have been weak and 
 irresolute, were hardened into fruitful decision by 
 the ministry of antagonism and pain. " Thou 
 art Simon " — a hearer, a man of loose hearsays 
 and happenings ; " Thou shalt be called Peter " 
 — a rock, a man of hard, compact, and resolute 
 convictions. But ''Simon" became "Peter" 
 
CHAPTER IV. 12-19 177 
 
 through, the ministry of the fiery trial. The 
 man of '' soft clothing " is in the luxury of kings' 
 houses ; the hard man with the camels' hair and 
 the leathern girdle is away out in the hardships 
 of the desert. " We must through much tribu- 
 lation enter into the Kingdom of God." 
 
 But the fiery trial not only reveals and 
 hardens the character, it also develops it by 
 bringing out its hidden beauties. I am using 
 the word develop as the photographer uses it. 
 You know how he brings out the lines of his 
 pictures. The picture is laid in the vessel, and 
 the liquid is moved and moved across it; it 
 passes over the face of the picture, and little by 
 little the hidden graces are disclosed. " All Thy 
 billows are gone over me." That is the Lord's 
 developer; it brings out the soft lines in the 
 character. Under its ministry we pass " from 
 strength to strength, "from grace to grace," 
 "from glory to glory." 
 
 And so the fiery trial tests and confirms and 
 develops the character. I do not wonder that 
 with conceptions such as these, and with such 
 outlooks, the apostle calls upon his Christian 
 readers to lift up their heads, to walk not as 
 children of shame, but as children of rejoicing. 
 And look at the motives he adduces to create 
 the spirit of rejoicing. "Look at your com- 
 panionship," he seems to say. " Ye are jpar- Verse 13 
 
178 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 takers of Christ's sufferings. ^^ In the furnace with 
 you is '' one like unto the Son of Man." We 
 have scarcely touched the fringe of life if we 
 have not discovered what that conviction means 
 to men. " Yet I do persuade myself," says 
 Samuel Rutherford to one of his correspondents, 
 " ye know that the weightiest end of the cross 
 of Christ that is laid upon you lieth upon your 
 strong Saviour; for Isaiah saith, 'In all your 
 afflictions he is afflicted.' blessed Second, 
 who suffereth with you ! And glad may your 
 soul be even to walk in the fiery furnace with 
 one like unto the Son of Man, who is also the 
 Son of G od. Courage ! Up with your heart ! 
 "When ye do tire He will bear both you and 
 your burden." And writing to Lady Forrest the 
 same saintly writer gives this comfort : " I hear 
 that Christ hath been so kind as to visit you 
 with sickness. He would have more service of 
 you. He is your loving husband, and would 
 draw you into the bonds of a sweeter love." 
 Look at your companionship! "Rejoice," in- 
 asmuch as the Lord is with you in unceasing 
 fellowship. 
 
 And look at the character of the Operator. 
 
 Verse 14 " The Spirit of glory resteth upon you^ In the fiery 
 
 trial the Operator is the Glory-spirit, the Maker 
 
 of glory. As though He were controlling the 
 
 ' hardships and trials and converting them into 
 
CHAPTER IV. 12-19 179 
 
 ministers of beauty and grace. The immeasur- 
 able waters of Niagara generate electrical power 
 which a man may use to engrave a name upon 
 a jewel ; and the Spirit of Glory can so employ 
 these waters of sorrow as to write our Father's 
 name upon our foreheads. In some hands the • 
 trial would be an agent of indiscriminate de- 
 struction. In some hands the implements in a 
 surgery would be implements of mutilation and 
 murder; in the hands of a wise and confident 
 surgeon they are the ministers of sanity and 
 health. " The Spirit of Glory resteth upon you," 
 and He has control of the implements ! He sits 
 by the fire. Look at the character of the 
 Operator, and you will be filled with rejoicing. 
 
 And look at the splendid issues of it all. ^^ At Verse 13 
 the revelation of His glory ye may rejoice with 
 exceeding joy^ "Why this jubilant rejoicing? 
 Because this shall be the ultimate issue : when 
 the Lord is revealed in His glory it will be 
 disclosed that we are sharers of the glory. The 
 Spirit of Glory, which has rested upon us, will 
 have wrought upon us, and brought us into the 
 Master's likeness. We "shall be manifested 
 with Him in glory." 
 
 Well, now, if this be the ministry of trial, 
 surely the fiery trial is a solemn necessity. 
 Luxurious ease would destroy us. If the winds 
 remained asleep we should remain weak and 
 
180 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 enervated. Life would drowse along in effemi- 
 nate dreams. The glory of tlie perfected Life 
 would never be ours. And so life must have its 
 crises. Judgments are necessities. Judgment 
 must " begin at the House of God." Even the 
 consecrated folk need the testing, the strengthen- 
 ing, the confirming discipline of suffering and 
 pain. Even Paul must be thrown into the fiery 
 furnace ! Even John must feel the bite of the 
 stinging flame ! And if that be so with Paul 
 and Peter and John, how much more for you 
 and me ! " If the righteous scarcely be saved, 
 where shall the ungodly and sinner appear ? " 
 What a work is our salvation ! These wills, 
 these desires, these yearnings, these bodies ! 
 What work God has with us, to lift us into His 
 own glory ! 
 
TENDING THE FLOCK 
 
 1 Peter v. 1-7 
 
 The elders therefore among you I exhort, who am a fellow- 
 elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, who am also 
 a partaker of the glory that shall he revealed : Shejyherd the 
 flock of God which is among you, exercising the oversight, 
 not of constraint, but willingly, according unto God; nor 
 yet for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind; neither as lording 
 it over the charge allotted to you, but making yourselves 
 ensamples to the flock. And tvhen the chief Shepherd shall 
 he manifested, ye shall receive the crown of glory thatfadeth 
 not away. Likewise, ye younger, be subject unto the elder. 
 Yea, all of you gird yourselves with humility, to serve one 
 another : f<yr God resisteth the proud, hut giveth grace to 
 the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty 
 hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time; casting all 
 your anxiety upon Him, because He carethfor you. 
 
 *' / exhortJ^ Let me fix your eyes upon the Verse 1 
 counsellor. There is an evangel in the speaker, 
 altogether apart from the inspiration of his 
 message. "We are contemplating Simon Peter 
 in the ripe, assured strength of his evening- 
 time. "I exhort." Shall we pause a moment 
 that we may invite the ministry of remini- 
 scence? By what chequered way has he 
 181 
 
182 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 reached this bourn of clear and quiet assurance ? 
 Let me recall some of the prominent landmarks. 
 "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of 
 men." . . . "Thou art the Christ, the Son of 
 the living God." ..." Even if I must die with 
 Thee, yet will I not deny Thee." . . . "Then 
 began he to curse and swear, saying, I know 
 not the man." . . . "Lord, Thou knowest all 
 things; Thou knowest that I love Thee." . . . 
 "Now when they saw the boldness of Peter, 
 they marvelled." . . . "I, a fellow - elder, a 
 witness of the sufferings of Christ, a partaker 
 of the glory that shall be revealed." It is a 
 wonderful evolution ! From the call of the 
 spring-time to the ripe, confident testimony 
 of the autumn-time ! And between the two 
 extremes what a medley of sharp and changeful 
 experience ! The rough, untutored, impulsive 
 character-force has been washed and disciplined 
 into discerning and fruitful strength. And now 
 I picture Simon Peter as an old saint, bearing 
 the marks of the stern fight; sealed with the 
 brands of the Lord Jesus; his face lit up with 
 the sober light of chastening memory and 
 glorious hope. "I am a witness of the suffer- 
 ings." Think of the content of the phrase 
 when it falls from the lips of Simon Peter! 
 How much he had seen which he now recalled 
 in tears ! " Could ye not watch with Me one 
 
CHAPTER V. 1-7 183 
 
 hour ? " He had seen that lonely and grief- 
 filled Presence. '' And the Lord turned and 
 looked upon Peter." He had caught a glimpse 
 of that betrayed face, and the features were 
 burnt into his soul in lines of remorseful fire. 
 "I am a witness of the sufferings." All the 
 black and heart-rending events of Gethsemane 
 and Calvary crowd the witnessing, for they 
 were never absent for an hour from the 
 Apostle's so penitent and regretful heart. But 
 Calvary did not eclipse Olivet. The terrors of 
 the Crucifixion were looked at in the soft light 
 of the Resurrection dawn and in the startling 
 wonders of the Ascension. And so yesterday 
 became linked with the morrow. Memory was 
 transfigured into hope. The witness became a 
 herald. The denier became the heir. " I am 
 a witness of the sufferings of Christ, who am 
 also a partaker of the glory that shall be 
 revealed." 
 
 And now let us listen to the scarred old 
 warrior's counsel. He is giving fatherly in- 
 struction to the officers of the Church. He 
 is speaking to the elders, the overseers, the 
 appointed leaders of these hallowed primitive 
 assemblies. I wish to give the counsel the 
 widest application, that it may include the 
 outermost circle of Christian service. If we 
 limited the counsel to bishops, then we should 
 
184 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 all listen to the tremendous charge as critical 
 or unconcerned spectators. If we included all 
 pastors and deacons, still the unconcerned 
 majority might listen with perilous relish to 
 the implied indictment. The counsel applies 
 to every kind of Christian leadership. Wher- 
 ever man or woman assumes the post of leader 
 of souls, guide to the home of God — whether 
 it be among children or adults, in visiting the 
 hospitals or in going from house to house, in 
 the pastorate or in the class, in the obscure 
 mission or in the conspicuous phases of cathedral 
 labours — the Apostle's counsel is pertinent, and 
 unfolds the primary dispositions which are the 
 secrets of prosperous service. 
 
 Mark, then, the opening word of the counsel. 
 Verse 2 '' Shepherd the flock of God which is among 
 you." It is a very wealthy and suggestive 
 word which forms the initial note of the 
 Apostle's instructions. The Authorised Version 
 translates it "feed," the Revised Version trans- 
 lates it " tend." Each element is significant of 
 the shepherd, and both are essential to the full 
 interpretation of the apostle's mind. It is a 
 wonderful sphere of service which is disclosed 
 to me. I am told that I can be the nourisher 
 of my brother; I am told that I can also be 
 his defence. I can "feed" him; I can stand 
 between him and his hunger. I can tend him ; 
 
CHAPTER V. 1-7 185 
 
 I can stand between him and his perils. That is 
 a beautiful ministry which God entrusts to me. 
 I can get in among my brother's wants and take 
 him bread. I can feed his faith, his hope, his 
 love. I can lead him into "green pastures and 
 by still waters," and discover to him the means 
 of growth and refreshment. I can get in among 
 my brother's perils and erect extra safeguards 
 and defences. It is possible to love my way in 
 between my brother and his appetites, between 
 his spirit and his snares. That is our ministry, 
 whatever be the precise character of the 
 leadership we have assumed. It matters little 
 or nothing whether we be called bishops, 
 pastors, teachers, visitors; our mission is to 
 feed and to fend, to take nourishing bread, 
 and to offer protective shelter. If a man 
 stand between his brother and spiritual neces- 
 sity, or between his brother and spiritual peril, 
 he is discharging the office of a day's-man, a 
 mediator, a faithful under-shepherd, working 
 loyally under the leadership of the "chief 
 Bishop and Shepherd of our souls." 
 
 How, then, is this ministry of feeder and 
 fender to be successfully discharged ? How is 
 it to be saved from offence and impertinence ? 
 How shall we gain admission to move among 
 the needs and perils of our brother's soul? 
 How shaU we gain an entrance into his secret 
 
186 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 place ? "What dispositions are required in order 
 to back the ministry and make it spiritually 
 effective ? The apostle acts as our counsellor, 
 and gives us detailed instruction in all these 
 things. 
 
 First of all, it must be the service of willing- 
 Verse 2 ness, " Not of constraint^ hid ivillingly.^^ One 
 volunteer is worth two pressed men. I am not 
 quite sure whether the proverbial saying is 
 pertinent. I am doubtful if an equation can 
 be established. On the high planes of spiritual 
 service no number of pressed men can take 
 the place of a volunteer. But can men be 
 pressed into unfruitful spiritual service ? Yes, 
 men are sometimes constrained by what they 
 call " the pressure of circumstances." They say 
 that they " could not very well get out of it." 
 They had been importuned so frequently that 
 for very shame they could decline no longer. 
 If they could have found another excuse, 
 another excuse would have been offered. But 
 their inventiveness failed them. Their excuse- 
 chamber was empty. They simply had to do 
 it! Their wills had no part in the hallowed 
 service. They were just pressed into the 
 ministry by circumstantial constraint which 
 they could no longer comfortably resist. What 
 shall we say about it ? Just this — that people 
 whose wills are not in the service, are really 
 
CHAPTER V. 1-7 187 
 
 not in the service at all. Where there is no 
 spontaneity the fervour is fictional, and we 
 shall never thaw the wintry bondage of men 
 by painted and theatrical fires. 
 
 But there is a loftier constraint than the 
 pressure of importunity and the failure of the 
 supply of excuse. There is the constraint of 
 conscience, which sends men into service 
 impelled by the sense of duty. But even the 
 conscience-labourer may toil and toil away in 
 a fruitless task. Men may do their duty 
 unwillingly, and the absence of the will deprives 
 their service of the very atmosphere which 
 would render it efficient. Duty, without the 
 inclination of the will, is cold and freezing, 
 and never makes a warm and genial way into 
 the hidden precincts of another's soul. If I 
 were stretched in pain and sickness I would 
 not care to be nursed by duty. All the atten- 
 tions might be regular and methodical, and yet I 
 should mourn the absence of the something which 
 makes the ministry winsome and alive. " I just 
 love to have her near my bed," said a hospital 
 patient to me the other day, speaking of her 
 Christly and consecrated nurse. That is duty 
 with an atmosphere. It is duty transfigured. 
 Duty may make people righteous ; alone it will 
 not make them good. "And scarcely for a 
 righteous man, will one die ; yet peradventuro 
 
188 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 for a good man some would even dare to die." 
 I do not think that duty will carry us far into 
 the deep hungers and weaknesses of our 
 fellow-men. We need the " plus," the gracious 
 inclination of the will, the leaning of the 
 entire being in the line of service. We need 
 to be swayed, not by the compulsion of external 
 pressure, not even by the lonely sovereignty 
 of the moral sense, but by an inward constraint, 
 "warm, sweet, tender," the unfailing impulse 
 of grace, abiding in us as '* a well, springing 
 up into eternal life." "Not of constraint, but 
 willingly." 
 
 Secondly, our service must be the service of 
 Verse 2 affection. " Nor yet for filthy lucre^ hut of a ready 
 mind,^^ We are not to be moved in our service 
 by any hunger for external reward, and do 
 not let us think that external rewards are 
 exhausted under the single category of money. 
 Men may take up Christian service to enrich 
 their purse, to enlarge their business, and in 
 many ways to advance a transient interest. 
 But we may also labour in the hunger for 
 recognition and applause, and I am not sure 
 which of the two occupies the lower sphere, 
 he who hungers for money, or he who thirsts 
 for applause. A preacher may dress and smooth 
 his message to court the public cheers, and 
 labourers in other spheres may bid for pro" 
 
CHAPTEE V. 1-7 189 
 
 minence, for imposing print, for grateful 
 recognition. All this unfits us for our task. 
 It destroys the fine sense of the shepherd. 
 It destroys his perception of the needs and 
 perils of the sheep. It despoils us of our 
 bread, and robs us of our staff, and we have 
 neither food nor protection to offer to our 
 hungering and endangered fellow-man. "Not 
 for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind." Do 
 thy service, not for the praises and rewards 
 of men, but as Martin Luther says, " from the 
 very bottom of the heart, out of love to the 
 thing itself, out of joyous devotion to the work 
 which the Lord thy God gives thee." 
 
 The service of willingness ! The service of 
 affection ! It must also be the service of 
 humility! ''''Neither as lording it over the^QTses^-z 
 Hock . . . gird yourselves with humility^ to 
 serve one another^ That is most subtle and 
 needed counsel. Who would have expected 
 that spiritual pastors would be warned against 
 lordliness and pride ? Who would have imagined 
 that men who are ministering the gospel of low- 
 liness should themselves be exalted in pride ! 
 It is one of the most insidious temptations which 
 beset the working disciple of Christ. Pride ever 
 lurks just at the heels of power. Even a little 
 authority is prone to turn the seemly walk into 
 a most offensive strut. But the peril is subtler 
 
190 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 still. "While I assume to feed my brother, my 
 own soul may be a-hungered. While I am 
 helping his defence, the enemy may be ravaging 
 my own land. The peril is subtler still. Some- 
 how we come to find a virtue in preaching and 
 teaching, and our preaching and teaching become 
 our doing. Teachers and preachers are somehow 
 allured outside their own message— its evangel 
 and its warnings — and we are solaced and 
 soothed by the lonely fact that we have shared 
 in its proclamation. It is a terrible temptation, 
 and if we yield to it, it swells the heart with 
 lordliness and pride. What is our security ? 
 *'A11 of you gird yourselves with humility." 
 Put on the apron of the slave! Go into the 
 awful presence of the Lord, and contemplate 
 His glory until the vision brings you wonder- 
 ingly to your knees ! '' Go, stand on the mount 
 before the Lord." That is the place where we 
 discover our size ! No man speaks of his great- 
 ness who has been closeted with God. Lordliness 
 changes into holy fear, and pride bows down in 
 reverent supplication. Oh, we must come from 
 the Presence-chamber into the pulpit ! Nay, the 
 pulpit itself must be the Presence-chamber, and 
 the man must preach in the consciously realised 
 presence of the Almighty and Eternal God. 
 The Lord will have no proud men in His service. 
 Such men are self-appointed. "I never knew 
 
CHAPTER V. 1-7 191 
 
 you." Their names are not to be fomid in the 
 Lamb's Book of Life. " God resisteth the proud." 
 He stands in the way and fights them ! " The 
 angel of the Lord stood in the way for an 
 adversary." It is an appalling thought ; our 
 strongest antagonist may be the Lord whom we 
 are professing to serve. " God resisteth the 
 proud." Let us hasten to add the complementary 
 evangel. " And giveth grace to the humble." 
 It is the humble, kneeling soul that receives 
 ineffable outpourings of Divine grace. Grace 
 ever seeks out the lowliest. 
 
 It streams from the hills, 
 It descends to the plain. 
 
 To the humble soul God gives the very dynamics 
 of fruitful service. In all spiritual ministry it 
 is only grace that tells. Nothing else counts ! 
 Other gifts may amuse, may interest, may allure, 
 but grace alone can engage in the labour of 
 spiritual redemption. The servants of the Lord 
 are to be filled with grace, and their overflow 
 will constitute their influence upon their fellows. 
 Out of them shall flow " rivers of water of life." 
 " God giveth grace to the humble." 
 
 Lastly, it must be the service of trustfulness. 
 " Casting all your anxiety upon Him^ because He ^^rse 7 
 careth for youJ^ Take your alarms to Him. 
 Talk out your fears with him. Lay them upon 
 
192 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 Him in quiet assurance. And this must be done 
 in the interests of spiritual economy. Terrible 
 is the waste of spiritual energy which results 
 from anxiety and fear. To allow anxiety to 
 rear itself in the soul is like permitting rank 
 weeds to grow in the flower-bed; and the worthier 
 growths, being deprived of nutriment, grow 
 faint and droop away. "He careth for you." 
 In these high matters the Lord is doing the 
 thinking. 
 
 Oh, could we but relinquish all 
 Our earthly props, and simply fall 
 On Thine almighty arms ! 
 
 And what is to be the reward of such services ? 
 Verse 4 " When the chief Shepherd shall be manifested 
 . . ." Some day we are to see Him face to 
 face. What then ? " Ye shall receive the 
 crown of glory. ^^ The victory crown will be 
 composed of leaves and flowers which will never 
 fade away ; of leaves which are the tokens of 
 abiding spring ; of flowers which are the tokens 
 of ever-enriching glory. 
 
THEOUGH ANTAGONISMS TO 
 PERFECTNESS 
 
 1 Peter v. 8-10 
 
 Be sober, he watchful : your adversary the devil, as a 
 roaHng lion, walheth about, seeking whom he may devour: 
 whom' withstand stedfast in the faith, knouing that the 
 same sufferings are accomplished in your brethren who are 
 in the world. And the God of all grace, who called you 
 unto His eternal glory in Christ, after that ye have suffered 
 a little while, shall Himself perfect, stablish, strengthen you. 
 
 " The devil . . . walketh about, seeking whom he Verse 8 
 may devour:' Peter's memory is here helping 
 Peter's message. Reminiscence is shaping his 
 counseL It does seem as though at- times this 
 apostle dips his pen in his own blood. At any 
 rate, the living crimson of his own experience 
 abundantly colours the page. The epistle is 
 hortatory : it is also biographical. The docu- 
 ment is alive. It unfolds a faith; it also 
 records a pilgrimage. In the passage which is 
 immediately before us one feels how the life 
 emerges as the commentary upon the message. 
 Let me for a moment identify portions of this 
 dim background, and set them in relation to 
 
 193 13 
 
194 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 the text. Here is the foreground, "God . . 
 who called you." Here is the background, 
 "And Jesus said unto them, Come ye after 
 Me." Here is the text, "Be watchful." Here 
 is the context, "Simon, Simon, sleepest thou? 
 Couldst thou not watch one hour?" Here is 
 the warning, "Your adversary, the devil . . . 
 walketh about, seeking whom he may devour." 
 Here is the reminiscence, " Simon, Simon, Satan 
 hath desired to have thee." Here is the evangel, 
 "The God of all grace . . . will make you 
 perfect." Here is the experience, "Thou art 
 Simon [hearer]; thou shalt be Peter" [a rock]. 
 I say that this man's life-blood stains his speech. 
 His words are life, not the expression of specu- 
 lation, but the utterance of a travail, the ripe 
 judgments of a man who has " known and felt." 
 And now he lays down his pen for a moment 
 and surveys his chequered days. He notes the 
 innumerable allurements which have beset his 
 path. He recalls the gay fascinations, the in- 
 centives to pride, the lure of power, the be- 
 witchment of personal ambition. He marks the 
 violence of vice, the tempestuous charge of 
 passion, the terrific onrush of the blind and 
 brutal forces of persecution. And all these 
 confront the lonely wayfarer as he picks his 
 way towards God. Life abounds in moral 
 antagonisms. The empire of devilry runs right 
 
CHAPTER Y. 8-10 195 
 
 up to our gates. The destructive mouth is open 
 on every side. The flesh lusts against the 
 spirit. Life is filled with moral menace ! All 
 this the apostle sees as he contemplates his 
 own pilgrimage, and so he takes up his pen 
 again and writes this warning to his young, 
 inexperienced, and somewhat wilful readers, 
 "Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, 
 walketh about, seeking whom he may devour." 
 I think there is something very suggestive 
 in the figures employed by the Bible to describe 
 the approaches of the powers of evil and night. 
 The devil has a fairly extensive wardrobe, 
 but his common and more familiar guises are 
 of three types — a serpent, an angel of light, 
 and a roaring lion. It is in one or other of 
 these three shapes that the forces of sin most 
 frequently assail us. They come in the guise 
 of the serpent. They beguile our senses. They 
 pervert our judgment. They enchant our 
 imaginations. We are fascinated, bewitched, 
 paralysed by the influence of some illicit and 
 unclean spell. The love of money becomes 
 a fascination. It holds a man as under a 
 wizard's spell. Gambling becomes a bewitch- 
 ment, a kind of spiritual bondage, in which 
 the poor soul, in mesmerised inclinations, is 
 slowly drawn towards its own destruction. The 
 devil approaches as a serpent, and like fixed 
 
196 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 and stupefied birds we are in peril of dropping 
 into his devouring jaws. He comes also in the 
 guise of an angel of light. He poses as an 
 evangelist. He plays the role of one whose 
 ministry it is to deepen our conception of the 
 love and graciousness of God. He tells us that 
 we do not think highly enough of God. He 
 loves us too much to be pained by our small 
 neglects. In fact, we best show our confidence 
 in God by fiisregarding these neglects. Our 
 trust is altogether too elementary and straight. 
 We should cast ourselves down from a few 
 pinnacles, and display to all men what a 
 wonderful confidence we have in the out- 
 stretched everlasting arms of God ! Such is 
 the devil as an angel of light. Such is the devil 
 as the preacher of the exceeding breadth of 
 our Father's love. Such is the devil intent on 
 easing the strain of our religious life, relaxing 
 its severities, and putting our feet into the way 
 of a more spacious providence and peace. He 
 would turn religion into thin refinements ; he 
 would convert a deep devotion into a glozing 
 plausibility ; and he would transform a hallowed 
 trust into light and flippant presumption. And 
 the devil also comes as a roaring lion. The 
 subtlety of the serpent is laid aside ; he discards 
 the sheen of the angel of light ; he appears as 
 sheer brutal force, an antagonist of terrific and 
 
CHAPTER V. 8-10 197 
 
 naked violence, bearing down his victims under 
 the heavy paws of relentless persecution. When 
 the apostle wrote this letter, the lion was about ; 
 Nero was at work ; the Christians were being 
 hunted unto death, in the vain attempt at 
 stamping out their faith and devotion to the 
 Man of Nazareth, their Saviour and their Lord. 
 He comes as a serpent, as an angel of light, as 
 a roaring lion. He came to the Master as a 
 serpent when he offered Him worldly power. 
 He came as an angel of light when he sought 
 to deepen and enrich His trust. He came to 
 Him as a roaring lion in the blows and blas- 
 phemies of the bloodthirsty multitude. This 
 antagonism we have got to meet. How can 
 we meet it in the hope of certain triumph ? 
 Let us turn to the apostle's counsel. 
 
 " Be soherP The culture of sobriety ! See to Verse 8 
 it that you are not intoxicated, drugged into 
 any kind of perilous stupor. Keep your head 
 clear. Be collected. "Be sober." Now, the 
 apostle is writing to men and women who are 
 professedly the followers of Jesus Christ, and 
 I think there are two perils in the religious life, 
 both of which have their issue in moral stupor. 
 "We can lose our senses in excitement, and we 
 can lose them in sleep. There are perils in 
 sensationalism, and there are perils in encroach- 
 ing drowsiness. There is the stupor which 
 
198 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 accompanies exaggeration, and there is the 
 stupor of indifference. There is an excessive 
 emotionalism which offers no barriers against 
 the incursions of the devih That is the peril of 
 all revivals. Men may " lose their heads," and 
 their very excitement fosters a moral drowsiness 
 which gives hospitality to the besetting forces 
 of temptation and sin. It is among the highly 
 emotional races that we find the profoundest 
 moral sleep. "Be sober." If your spirit be 
 fervent, at all pains let it be clear. " The spirits 
 of the prophets are subject to the prophets." 
 And on the other side there is the moral stupor 
 which is the issue of a growing indifference, 
 frequently initiated by small neglects. A man 
 neglects the pointing of his house ; damp enters ; 
 chills are born ; disease is invited ; death reigns. 
 Relaxation in trifles is often the beginning of 
 moral benumbment. Or it may be that a 
 Christian man begins to take his pleasures in 
 injurious measure. He used to sojourn in them ; 
 now he lives in them. "He that liveth in 
 pleasure is dead." The helpful potion has 
 become an illicit drug. Taken in homoeopathic 
 doses the pleasure was a tonic and restorative ; 
 taken in larger measure it became an opiate, 
 and sank the life in perilous sleep. Whether 
 our stupor be occasioned by excitement, or 
 by neglect, or by dram-drinking, whether of 
 
CHAPTER V. 8-10 199 
 
 alcoholic liquor or of drugging deliglits, such 
 stupor gives the devil his opportunity, and 
 offers him an open field in which his triumph 
 is inevitable. " Be sober." 
 
 " Be ivatchfulJ^ The culture of perceptive- Verse 8 
 ness ! Not only be sober, but thoroughly 
 awake, exercising your perceptions to the rarest 
 and most fruitful refinement. We know the 
 large possibilities which allure us in the cultiva- 
 tion of the physical senses ; equally large 
 possibilities glow before us in the culture of the 
 soul. Every exercise of watchfulness ensures 
 us stronger sight. In the quest of the Divine wo 
 come to self-possession. In this line of culture 
 the progress is from the greater to the less. 
 The moral senses perceive ever finer and finer 
 essences of good and evil. Moral progress is in 
 the direction of the scruple. The finest scholar 
 in the school of Christ is he who has the rarest 
 perception of the moral trifle. " He that doeth 
 the least of these commandments is greatest in 
 the kingdom of heaven." Therefore, exercise 
 thy moral senses, lest the hordes of evil should 
 enter through the gates of unperceived neglects. 
 '' Be watchful." 
 
 " Stedfast in the faithJ^ The culture of faith ! Verse 9 
 Our faith has to be " stedfast," firm, solid, 
 impenetrable like a wall. Our faith has to be 
 " stedfast," a rampart of assurance, close, 
 
200 THE FIEST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 compact, and invulnerable. I have spoken of 
 the cultivation of the moral sense, and of its 
 progress in the detection of the trifle. Here 
 we are taken to a plane of still higher educa- 
 tion, the culture of the spiritual sense, the 
 apprehension of God, proceeding toward the 
 goal of calm and invincible assurance. To be 
 stedfast in faith is to be sure of God. The 
 grand attainment necessitates continual exercise, 
 the " practice of the presence of God." We 
 must exercise our spiritual muscles in the 
 ministry of communion with God, in praise and 
 prayer and supplication and intercession; the 
 exercise must be a wrestling, determined and 
 continuous, until there steals into our life an 
 awed sense of the Divine presence, and in the 
 calmness of assurance we can confidently say, 
 *'I know that my Eedeemer liveth." How, 
 then, shall we resist the devil, in whatsoever 
 guise he may appear to us ? By the culture of 
 sobriety; by the culture of moral perceptive- 
 ness ; and by that culture of spiritual apprehen- 
 sion which will lead us into the peace which is 
 strength — " the peace of God which passeth all 
 understanding." 
 
 Now, let me carry your minds forward a 
 moment to the contemplation of the all-sujfficient 
 dynamic^ which may be ours in this inevitable 
 conflict with the powers of evil and night. The 
 
CHAPTER V. 8-10 201 
 
 culture of sobriety, the culture of perceptiveness, 
 the culture of faith will open out our lives to 
 Him whom the apostle calls " the God of all gracej^ Verse 10 
 and by His presence we shall be energised. 
 " The God of all grace ! " It is a beautiful and 
 wealthy phrase, suggestive of varied endow- 
 ment for varied and changing need. My need 
 is manifold; the grace of God is also "mani- 
 fold." It will fit itself to my need as light or 
 heat, as water or bread. My God is " the God 
 of all grace," now like sweet sunshine, now like 
 burning flame, now like refreshing dew, now 
 like the falling, softening rain. " The God of 
 all grace," a tower and a sword, my refuge and 
 my shield. " My grace is sufficient for thee " ; 
 sufficient amid the beguilements and fascina- 
 tions of the serpents ; sufficient amid the 
 plausible refinements of the angel of light ; 
 sufficient amid the apparently destructive forces 
 of the lion of violence and persecution. The 
 whole personality, in every faculty and power, 
 shall be pervaded with Divine forces, and in 
 thy God thou shalt find an exuberant fountain 
 of mercy, goodness, and compassion. " My God 
 shall make all grace to abound towards you." 
 
 And what is to be the ultimate glory ? '' The Verse 10 
 God of all grace . . . shall Himself 'perfect^ 
 stablish, strengthen you^ Perfected ! Established ! 
 Strengthened! Settled! They are all archi- 
 
202 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 tectural metaphors, and are massed together to 
 suggest tlie fine wholeness, consistency, finish 
 and security of the grace-blessed character as it 
 will appear upon the glorious fields of light! 
 " Established," every layer firmly and securely 
 based ! *' Strengthened," splendidly seasoned, 
 with no danger of splitting or of warping! 
 "Settled," the entire structure resting evenly, 
 comfortably, upon the best and surest founda- 
 tion ! These are the metaphors, and they 
 unveil before me future attainments of blessed- 
 ness, when the grace-filled character shall 
 appear before God like a firm, well-finished, 
 and gloriously proportioned building; all the 
 manifold faculties co-operating in rare associa- 
 tion ; every power firm, decisive, and sanctified, 
 and the entire life settled in holy calm and 
 comfort on "the one foundation, Jesus Christ 
 our Lord." 
 
 Now, see the glorious range of the entire 
 Verse 10 passage. ''The God of all grace, who called 
 you unto His eternal glory T That glory is not 
 altogether remote. Even now we are beginning 
 to share it. The spring is not yet here, but the 
 lark is up ! Glory awaits us in Emmanuel's 
 land; but we are finding heavenly tokens by 
 the way. 
 
 The man of grace hath found 
 Glory begun below. 
 
THE SECOND EPISTLE OE 
 PETER 
 
LIBERTY! EQUALITY! FRATERNITY! 
 
 2 Peter i. 1, 2 
 
 Simon Peter^ a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christy 
 to them that have obtained an equally precious faith ivith 
 us in the righteousness of our God and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ : Grace to you and peace be multiplied in the know- 
 ledge of God arid of Jesu^ our Lord. 
 
 When I had read this passage through many 
 times in my effort to discover the inwardness 
 and sequence of the apostle's thought, there 
 leapt into my mind the great watchword of the 
 French Revolution, "Liberty, Equality, Fra- 
 ternity!" My text seemed to accept the prof- 
 fered ministry of the watchword, and deigned 
 to express itself through the heightened and 
 glorified clarion of the Revolution. Here is 
 the secret of liberty : " A bondservant and apostle Verse i 
 of Jesus Christy And here is the basis of 
 equality : " They that have obtained an equally 
 precious faith with us.'' And here is the very 
 genius of fraternity : " Grace to you and peace Verse 2 
 be multiplied in the knowledge of God and of 
 Jesus our Lord'' Here, then, we have the 
 
 205 
 
206 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 apostolic evangel of liberty, equality, and 
 fraternity. 
 Verse 1 Here is the secret of liberty : " A bondslave of 
 Jesus.'" At the heart of all trae freedom there 
 is a certain bondage. Liberty without restraint 
 is always self-destructive. The man who will 
 not be bound to anything or anybody is always 
 the most enslaved. Even anarchist societies 
 are compelled to have some rules, and the 
 making of a rule always implies the forging 
 of a chain. Liberty must be limited if it is to 
 be possessed. Every type of freedom has its 
 chains. That is true of intellectual freedom. 
 A man who would be intellectually free must 
 pay obeisance to certain laws of thought. 
 Mental disorder is a dark enslavement. The 
 movement that springs from obedience to the 
 laws of thought is a fruitful freedom. Free 
 thought begins in wearing a chain ; the mental 
 freeman is at heart a slave. That is true also 
 of political freedom. Political freedom consists 
 in the recognition of individual rights. To 
 assert my brother's rights is to state a limit 
 to my own. Here again we start with a chain. 
 We recognise limitations. The real political 
 freeman is at heart a slave. And this is true 
 also of moral freedom ; no man is morally free 
 who does not pay homage to his conscience. 
 Moral freedom springs from the sense of 
 
CHAPTER I. 1, 2 207 
 
 obligation. Apart from that ligament, tliat 
 bond, the wbole body of the moral life 
 falls limb from limb in inextricable chaos and 
 confusion. 
 
 Now let us lift the argument up to the 
 highest type of freedom, the glorious freedom 
 of the spirit. A great writer has defined the 
 French notion of liberty as political economy 
 and the English notion of liberty as personal 
 independence. The Christian conception of 
 liberty is inclusive of these, but infinitely 
 greater. The most spacious of all liberties 
 is liberation from seK, and this kind of 
 freedom springs from initial bondage. True 
 freedom in the spirit begins in bondage to 
 the Lord of Life. I am not surprised, there- 
 fore, that the. Apostle Peter and the Apostle 
 Paul, men who sing so loudly and so triumph- 
 antly of the wealth and plenteousness of their 
 freedom, should begin by proclaiming them- 
 selves the Master's slaves. " Paul, a bondslave 
 of Jesus." "Peter, a bondslave and apostle 
 of Jesus Christ." Bondage is the secret of 
 freedom. 
 
 "Peter, a bondslave." Let us see what is 
 implied in this suggestive word. First, the 
 term "bondslave" implies the achnoiuUdgment 
 of a fact He is a slave. He has been bought. 
 He is the Lord's property. A great price has 
 
208 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 been paid for him. The apostle thought of his 
 Master's weary days and nights, of the tears 
 and agonies of Gethsemane, of the shame and 
 darkness and abandonment of Calvary. By all 
 this expenditure on the part of the Saviour 
 the apostle had been bought. He acknowledged 
 his Master's rights ; he was his Master's slave. 
 Secondly, the term " bondslave " implies the 
 assumption of an attitude. The apostle puts 
 himself in the posture of homage and obedience. 
 His eye was ever watching the Master, his ear 
 was ever listening. He was a slave, but not 
 servile. I do not know what word just ex- 
 presses it ; I have been unable to find one. 
 But this I know, that if we would learn what 
 ** slave " means in my text we must go to the 
 love-sphere and seek the interpretation there. 
 "VVe must go where the lover slaves for the 
 loved, and yet calls her slavery exquisite 
 freedom. A real loving mother, slaving for 
 her child, would not change her slavery for 
 mines of priceless wealth or for unbroken years 
 of cushioned ease. "Thy willing bondslave 
 I." And thirdly, to be a slave implies the 
 discharge of a mission. "Peter, a bondslave 
 and apostle." He is sent forth to do the 
 Master's will. The Master bids; he goes. 
 Anywhere! Through the long, dusty, tiring 
 highways of righteousness, or to the valley 
 
CHAPTER I. 1, 2 209 
 
 f gloom ; " through the thirsty desert or the 
 
 dewy mead." 
 
 His not to reason why, 
 His not to make reply, 
 His but to do and die ! 
 
 But in that bondage the apostle finds a perfect 
 freedom. All the powers of his being are 
 emancipated and sing together in glorious 
 liberty. Life that is fundamentally bound be- 
 comes like an orchestra, every faculty con- 
 stituting a well-tuned instrument, and all of 
 them co-operating in the production of a 
 harmony which is well-pleasing in the ears of 
 God. 
 
 And here we have the basis of equality : 
 ^' To them that have obtained an equally pi^ecious 
 faith with us in the righteousness of our God.^^ 
 Let us rearrange the words a little. This I 
 think is the meaning : in the righteousness of 
 God, the absolute justice and fairness of God, 
 you have obtained an equally precious faith 
 with us. God in His righteousness has, in this 
 consummate gift of faith, made us gloriously 
 equal. Now look at that. Where does the 
 apostle begin his reasoning about our primary 
 equality? He begins with the righteousness 
 of God. God is perfectly fair. He is no re- 
 specter of persons. I know this faith is troubled 
 and disturbed by the material inequalities we 
 
210 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 see around us. Here is my little one safe at 
 home in bed, and here is another little one, 
 not much older, out upon the streets in the 
 late night hungry and cold. Is God fair ? Here 
 is a good man in chronic pain; here is a bad 
 man in health and wealth and honour. Yet 
 God is righteous in His purpose ! He does not 
 treat us like puppets and marionettes. He has 
 endowed us with brain and conscience and 
 heart and will, and He has committed to us 
 the power by which many of these gross in- 
 justices can be rectified. If the Church of the 
 living God were to awake from her sleep to- 
 day you and I know how much could be done 
 to rearrange material comforts, and to crush 
 and destroy many things which make for misery, 
 disease, and death. While our sword is rusting, 
 and our couch has almost become our tomb, do 
 not let us raise a mere debating-society topic 
 and ask the question : Is God fair ? It is for 
 our own dignity, and for the disciplining and 
 perfecting of the race, that our God has com- 
 mitted unto us the power by which many of 
 these burdensome iniquities may be removed. 
 But, leaving all these, let it be said that in the 
 great primary things, the things out of which 
 all other equalities take their spring, we may 
 be grandly equal. We may all obtain an 
 equally precious faith, the faith-dynamic which 
 
CHAPTEE I. 1, 2 211 
 
 can remove mountains. Faith itself is a gift 
 of God, and in this all men may be equal. 
 You and Paul ! The Salvation Army Captain 
 and Martin Luther ! " Precious faith," the 
 apostle calls it, precious because of the wealth 
 which through it comes into the life. " Faith 
 buys wine and milk," says an old commentator. 
 Faith goesj into the country of God among His 
 vineyards, and out among His fields, and eats 
 and drinks the rare and sweet and toothsome 
 things. I say that in this great primary matter 
 we may all be equal, and in this fundamental 
 equality all other healthy equalities will find 
 their impulse and resource. 
 
 And lastly, we have here the genius of frater- 
 nity. " Grace to you and peace he multiplied in ^^rse 2 
 the knowledge of God and of Jesus''' How deep 
 and exquisite is the spirit of fraternity ! What 
 do these people seek for one another ? Know- 
 ledge ! " Knowledge of the Lord." And this 
 means the advanced stages of a science, the 
 most perfect learning, the riper unfoldings of 
 the glory of God. They are ambitious for one 
 another, that spiritual obscurities may be clari- 
 fied, and that the partial may be perfected. A 
 little while ago, at the dawning of the day, I 
 looked out over a great stretch of country from 
 the vantage ground of a lofty summit. I could 
 only see things dimly, in vague and imperfect 
 
212 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 outline. There beneatli me lay stretched out 
 into the far distance a long, white streak of dull 
 silver ; and there rested a grey cloud ; and 
 yonder loomed a dark botch which seemed to 
 be a remnant of the departing night. But the 
 light came on apace, and my knowledge was 
 advanced and perfected. The thin white streak 
 turned out to be a river ! The bank of grey 
 mist revealed itself as a lake ! The dark botch, 
 which seemed like the belated baggage of the 
 night, revealed itself as a forest ! " The glory 
 of the Lord shall be revealed." " Now I know 
 in part, but then. . . !" "Grace to you and 
 peace be multiplied in the knowledge of God." 
 Out of this advanced and advancing knowledge 
 there is to come a multiplication of grace and 
 peace. Grace is to be multiplied; the single 
 drops are to become showers ; the solitary rays 
 are to glow like the noon. And peace is to be 
 multiplied, deepened, heightened, and enriched ! 
 Is not this the very genius of fraternity ? What 
 thing more beautiful can brotherhood grow than 
 wishes and intercessions like these ? 
 
THE CHRISTIAN'S EESOURCES 
 
 2 Peter i. 1-4 
 
 Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christy to 
 them that have obtained an equally precious faith with us in 
 the righteousness of our God and Saviour Jesus Christ : Grace 
 to you and i^eace he multijdied in the knoivledge of God and 
 of Jesus our Lord ; seeing that His Divine power hath 
 granted unto us all things that pertain unto life and 
 godliness, through the knowledge of Him that called us hy 
 His oivn glory and virtus ; whereby He hath granted unto 
 us His precious and exceeding great promises ; that through 
 these ye may become partakers of the Divine nature, having 
 escaped from the corruption that is in the world by lust. 
 
 Heee is the apostle reckoning up his resources 
 in the spirit. "What has he got in the bank? 
 Divine power, glory, virtue. How is the wealth Verse 3 
 of the bank given out to him ? In " exceeding 
 great and precious promises " ; in " all things 
 that pertain to life and godliness." And what 
 is accomplished by this abundant and lavishly 
 distributed wealth ? " That through these ye may Verse 4 
 become partakers of the Divine nature, having 
 escaped from the corruption that is in the 
 world by lust.'''' Where had the apostle gained 
 the knowledge of his resources ? He had found 
 213 
 
214 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE. 
 
 them in the fellowship of the Lord Jesus, and 
 he was never weary of reciting his discovery? 
 to others. We may be sure that when the 
 Apostle Paul went up to Jerusalem, and tarried 
 with Peter, it would be of these marvellous 
 riches that the saintly fisherman would speak. 
 " I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode 
 with him fifteen days." This well-trained and 
 expert student, who had sat at the feet of 
 Gamaliel, and who had proved to be one of his 
 most alert and progressive disciples, goes up 
 to Jerusalem to sit at the feet of another 
 teacher, the fisherman Peter from the Galilean 
 lake ! "I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, 
 and abode with him fifteen days." The pupil 
 of Gamaliel wanted to hear from the lips of the 
 fisherman all that his memory could recall and 
 all that tongue could tell of those three eventful 
 years ! Long into the night they would sit and 
 talk; long after the last wayfarer had gone 
 home, and the sounds in the streets were stilled ! 
 The pupil could never get enough of the story, 
 and the teller of the story never grew tired in 
 its recital, and many times, in those crowded 
 fifteen days, the dawn looked in through the 
 lattice and found these sleepless men still busied 
 in the story of their Lord. Peter would lead 
 the eager and reverent steps of his new kins- 
 man all the way across the years — the call on 
 
CHAPTER I. 1-4 215 
 
 the beach, that made him a disciple, the strange 
 revealing miracle on the lake, the sermon on 
 the hill, the private communions with the twelve 
 when the crowd had gone away, the awful and 
 overwhelming splendour of the transfigured 
 Presence on the Mount: then in hushed and 
 broken voice Peter would tell of Gethsemane, 
 of the betrayal, of the scene among the servants 
 in the hall, of his own denial, of his Master's 
 broken-hearted look, of the scourge and the 
 crown of thorns, and the ribaldry and agonies 
 of Calvary; and then the fisherman-teacher 
 would recover his tone and feelings again as 
 he related the wonders of the Eesurrection, and 
 all the gracious surprises of those altogether 
 surprising forty days, until this pupil of Gamaliel, 
 this once-while persecutor of the Saviour, could 
 scarcely tell whether he was in the body or out 
 of it ! Depend upon it, those fifteen days with 
 Peter left uneffaceable marks upon the mind 
 and soul of Paul. 
 
 Well, now, ours is not the privilege of hearing 
 that story from the lips of the fisherman-saint ; 
 but if I look at my text aright I think that here 
 Peter puts his finger upon what he conceived 
 to be the three great characteristics of his 
 Master's life. It is something to have the 
 words this man employs when his eyes sweep 
 across the marvellous experiences which he had 
 
216 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 been privileged to share. "What does he think 
 about it all ? "What are the things which stand 
 out in predominant distinction ? If there are 
 hills and mountains in a life altogether super- 
 lative, what are the mountains? And here, I 
 think, is the apostle's answer, given in three of 
 the great words which lie like the great founda- 
 tions of my text— His "Divine power," His 
 "glory," His "virtue." 
 
 That is supremely interesting as coming to us 
 from one so human, so altogether akin to us 
 as the Apostle Peter. When he flings his mind 
 back in the contemplation of his Master, he 
 summarises his ever-fresh impressions in the 
 words, "power," "virtue," "glory." That is 
 what Peter found in the Lord: and that is 
 what we may find in the Lord to-day. 
 Verse 3 What have we in the bank ? Divine 'power. 
 In what had Peter witnessed the power? He 
 had marvelled at the Master's power over Him- 
 seK. He had stood in silent wonder as he gazed 
 at Jesus' self-possession and self-control. It 
 was all so opposed to his own self-distraction, 
 his seK-dissipation and indecision. He had 
 marked his Master's power of patience, His 
 refusal to be hurried into any precipitate action, 
 His quiet waiting for the appointed time: 
 "Mine hour is not yet come." He had witnessed 
 the Lord's inexhaustible patience in the presence 
 
CHAPTEE I. 1-4 217 
 
 of His foes. How full of waiting gentleness He 
 was through all those three years! How He 
 bore with Judas, and how eagerly He watched 
 for signs of his return. He knew him, He 
 pleaded with him ; even when Judas was intent 
 on betrayal He held him as by a hair. And 
 Peter had seen the Lord's patience with His 
 friends. It takes an immense storage of power 
 to be patient with dull people. And the Lord's 
 disciples had been very dull, and they had 
 imbibed the lessons very slowly. " Do ye not 
 yet understand?" ''Oh, slow of heart to 
 believe ! " And yet the lesson had been quietly 
 repeated, and no sign of irritableness was wit- 
 nessed in the Master's speech and behaviour. 
 He condescended to the level of the dullest- 
 witted disciple, and patiently bore with him as 
 he learned the elements of the gospel of grace. 
 I say Peter had gazed upon all this — it had been 
 a daily phenomenon — and now when he looked 
 back upon it all, and recalled his impressions 
 of these marvellous years, he was re-impressed 
 with the wealth of the " Divine power " of his 
 Eedeemer. 
 
 But Peter had also witnessed the Master^ 
 power over others. He had seen His trans- 
 figuring influence over their souls. He had 
 seen faces illumined by His touch. He had 
 watched the lighting up of a darkened life. 
 
218 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 He had seen the rekindling of a Magdalene 
 and the restoration of a Zaccheus. He had 
 seen the cold, paralysing burden of guilt fall 
 away at the imperative of the Lord's command: 
 *'Thy sins be forgiven thee." And when the 
 once paralysed body buoyantly stepped away 
 from the Master's presence, Peter detected 
 behind the released body a quickened and 
 liberated soul. 
 
 Peter had also seen the transfiguring power 
 of the Lord upon the minds of others. He had 
 seen Him break the tyranny of mental bondage, 
 the sovereignty of vicious thinking, and he 
 had seen the oppressor stand clothed and in 
 his right mind. He had finally witnessed the 
 Lord's power over the bodies of men. He could 
 command the forces of health, and they came 
 at His bidding. He could marshal them as an 
 army and antagonise disease and drive it away. 
 He had seen leprosy pass out of a man's face 
 like a tide retiring from the beach. He had 
 seen the mystic element of life return into^ a 
 vacant body, and all its functions and faculties 
 were restored. Is there any wonder that, when 
 Peter gazed back upon all these things, his 
 soul should bow in holy reverence in the con- 
 templation of the Master's power? 
 
 What else did the apostle find emphasised 
 in his retrospect? He was confronted by the 
 
CHAPTER I. 1-4 219 
 
 all-predominant peak of the Lord's " W7'iue." Verse 3 
 The moral goodness of His Master was never 
 away from his sight. And let us remember 
 that Peter now uses words with the Saviour's 
 contents. He is judging his Master by the 
 Master's own standards. There are many ways 
 of using the same word, but he employs it in 
 the highest significance. A scavenger may use 
 the word " clean " as descriptive of a freshly 
 swept road; a surgeon may use the word 
 " clean " as applied to the instruments prepared 
 for an operation; but how exacting is the 
 second usage as compared with the first ! And 
 here is the word "virtue." As employed by 
 the world it has a very impoverished content, 
 a kind of mere scavenger significance; but 
 when employed by the Master it embraces 
 absolute purity in the profoundest depths of 
 the life. And I say Peter applies the Lord's 
 own standard to the Lord's own life, and he 
 pronounces it full of virtue. He had listened 
 to His conversation, and never for one moment 
 had the print of an unclean or unfair word 
 crossed his Master's lips. He had seen Him in 
 His dealings with others, and never had a 
 suggestion of double-dealing appeared in His 
 behaviour. He had seen Him in His public 
 life, and marked how He had rejected the help 
 of all immoral auxiliaries and of all short cuts 
 
220 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 to a coveted end. He liad refused the ministry 
 of fire and the support of the sword, and the 
 countenance and patronage of kings. " Wilt 
 thou that we call down fire from heaven?" 
 He would have none of it. "Lord, here are 
 swords!" "They that take the sword shall 
 perish by the sword." " Then Herod questioned 
 with Him in many words." "He answered him 
 nothing." Peter was astounded at the austerity 
 and holy sovereignty of his Master's "virtue." 
 And there is one other peak on which the 
 apostle gazed when he surveyed the three 
 Verse 3 wonderful years — the peak of Divine ^^ glory J^ 
 "What is glory? It is the bloom of character. 
 It is majesty issuing in grace. It is solar 
 glory falling upon infirm eyes in rays of softest 
 shining. It is holiness consummated in tender- 
 ness. It is truth in the radiant robes of mercy. 
 It is the splendour of the Godhead shedding 
 itself abroad in the delicacy of love. We must 
 never dissociate grace from majesty ; in reality 
 we are unable to do it, but we are sorely 
 tempted in thought to make the division. In 
 literal truth we can no more dissociate them 
 than we can separate the sun from the sunlight. 
 *' We beheld His glory, full of grace and truth.^^ 
 So that when we are contemplating the glory 
 of the Lord we are among the holy tendernesses, 
 the majestic gentkuesses, the incorruptible love 
 
CHAPTER I. 1-4 221 
 
 which forgives and is never defiled. Glory is 
 the manifested presence of the Lord ; warm and 
 gentle as sunshine, and clean and pure as fire. 
 Such are the outstanding characteristics of the 
 Master's life as recalled by this fisherman-seer, 
 the man who once shrank from his Master in 
 the awful consciousness of a tremendous dis- 
 parity, but who now longs and prays for an 
 even closer and intimate communion. 
 
 Having named these three great significant 
 wealths in the Lord Jesus, the apostle now pro- 
 claims them as the possible resources of all men. 
 Because these riches are in the Lord Jesus they 
 constitute a reservoir of treasure from which all 
 His disciples can draw. It is wealth in the bank,. 
 and to us is given the privilege and the right to 
 draw out from the bank and find mercy and 
 grace in every time of need. What, then, may 
 we get from this Lord of power and virtue and 
 glory ? We may obtain ^^ precious and exceeding Verse 4 
 great jproraises.^^ Now, what is a promise ? In 
 our modern usage it is rather a light-weight 
 word. It is often used as synonymous with 
 "wish," and it carries no heavy significance. But 
 the word as used in the New Testament has a 
 far wider and vaster content. A promise of 
 the Lord has a threefold purpose : it reveals an 
 ideal, it kindles an ambition, it inspires a hope. 
 We may take any promise we please in the Word 
 
222 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEB, 
 
 of God, and we shall find it enshrines the secret 
 of this threefold ministry. Take, for instance, 
 the promise " I wiU give you rest." Here we 
 have the revelation of the ideal— the restful life, 
 the harmonious life; not the still life of a 
 mountain tarn, but the full, brimming life of the 
 river. Rest is not the repose of stillness ; it is 
 the absence of friction, the music of co-operation. 
 Here, then, is an ideal. As I contemplate it, it 
 kindles an ambition, and my soul covets the 
 gracious inheritance. A gospel promise trans- 
 forms ambition into a mighty hope, and in the 
 strength of a great expectancy the promised 
 thing becomes possessed. So it is with all the 
 promises of the Lord. They are "exceeding 
 great " the ideal stretches across the life and fills 
 the firmament; and they are "precious," pregnant 
 with the possibility of inconceivable enrichment. 
 But all this is not enough. A promise may 
 reveal an ideal, and it may kindle an ambition, 
 and it may inspire a hope, and yet it may fail to 
 confer an operative endowment. I am not sur- 
 prised, therefore, to find that the apostle goes on 
 to record the gift of an endowment which is as 
 Ver.e 3 sure as the word of the promise. " His Divine 
 power hath granted unto us all things that pertain 
 unto life and godliness,'' In the Lord the behever 
 has not only promise, but equipment. "All 
 things that pertain to life ! " The life that now 
 
CHAPTER T. 1-4 223 
 
 is ! Whatever is requisite for a splendid life we 
 may assuredly find in our Lord. It is not needful 
 to have a strong body, but it is essential to have 
 a fine judgment, and this we may find in the 
 Lord. " The meek will He guide in judgment." 
 " I will counsel thee with Mine eye upon thee.'* 
 " He that f olloweth Me shall not walk in dark- 
 ness, but shall be the light of life." It is not 
 needful to have a heavy purse, but it is essential 
 to have a sweet temper, and this we may find in 
 the Lord. A harsh and ugly temper is not only 
 destructive to one's own peace, and mars one's 
 own work, but it works havoc upon the peace 
 and ministry of others. " Love suifereth long " ; 
 it is a fine, chaste, gracious temper, one of the 
 commanding things that pertain to life and 
 godliness. It is not needful to have a great 
 following, but it is essential to have a com- 
 panionable conscience, and this we may find in 
 the Lord. A man has got a splendid travelling 
 companion when he is on good terms with his 
 own conscience. And a man is weak, miserably 
 weak, even with the support of a multitude, if 
 his own conscience is ranked among his foes. 
 " A good conscience " is one of the things that 
 pertain to life, and we may find in the bank 
 "a conscience void of offence." "The things 
 that pertain unto hfe " are not the things that 
 are commonly named ; and " the things that per- 
 
224 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 tain unto life and godliness " are still more rarely 
 found upon the lips of men. " The things that 
 pertain unto life and godliness " are such things 
 as I have- named — a good judgment, a sweet 
 temper, a companionable conscience, and above 
 all, and as the root of all, the gift of faith, the 
 gift of love, the fruits of forgiveness, the grand 
 sense of reconciliation with God, which form the 
 glorious inheritance of every man in Jesus 
 Christ our Lord. And all this we may take out 
 of the bank, " exceeding great and precious 
 promises," filling one's life with a vast ideal and 
 with a fervent ambition and with an ardent 
 hope ; and " all things that pertain unto life and 
 godliness," everything that is needful for the 
 attainment of moral and spiritual strength and 
 perfectness. 
 
 And so we have looked at our wealth in 
 the bank, the power and virtue and glory of 
 the Lord. And we have looked at what we 
 can draw out of the bank — " exceeding great 
 and precious promises"; "all things that pertain 
 unto life and godliness." And what is to be 
 the end of it all ? What is our possible 
 Verse 4 destiny ? " That through these ye may become 
 partakers of the Divine nature^ having escaped 
 from the corruption that is in the world by lust^ 
 So the ministry of the wealth is to effect a 
 deliverance and a glorious adoption! We are 
 
CHAPTER I. 1-4 225 
 
 to escape one thing and find refuge in another. 
 Here is our deliverance, "having escaped the 
 corruption that is in the world." Alas ! we can 
 be in no doubt as to the presence of corruption. 
 It is everywhere about us; in this corruption 
 men and women are everywhere enslaved. The 
 enslavement has various guises. Dante, in the 
 Divina Commedia^ tells us that when he turned 
 from the desert plain to scale the shining mount 
 he encountered three beasts. And first 
 
 A leopard, supple, Hthe, exceeding fleet, 
 Whose skin full many a dusky spot did stain. 
 
 He found a leopard in the way, a beast which 
 typified the love of sensual beauty, and in 
 this beastliness many souls are enslaved. And 
 then he met a lion 
 
 Who seemed as if upon him he would leap, 
 With head upraised and hunger fierce and wild. 
 
 In the lion he typified the pride of strength, the 
 vanity of perilous independence. And in this 
 servitude how many souls are enslaved ? And 
 then he met a she-wolf — 
 
 A she-wolf with all greed defiled. 
 
 Laden with hungry leanness terrible, 
 
 That many nations had their peace beguiled. 
 
 And the she-wolf typified the spirit of greed, 
 the imprisoning bondage in which many souls 
 are enslaved. These three beasts are ever 
 
226 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 found in tlie way of tlie man wlio would leave 
 the level plain and take the shining slope. He 
 will meet the leopard and the lion and the 
 wolf. But in Christ we have the means of 
 deliverance. We can pass the beasts in safety, 
 and " escape the corruption that is in the 
 world through lust." And with the deliverance 
 there comes the glory of adoption. From the 
 company of beasts we are translated into the 
 fellowship and family of God. We "become 
 partakers of the Divine nature." We draw 
 upon the power of the Lord, the virtue of the 
 Lord, the glory of the Lord ! More and more 
 does the beauty of the Lord rest upon us and 
 within us. We become ever more finely en- 
 dowed with the unsearchable riches of Christ. 
 "We are transformed into the same image 
 from glory to glory." 
 
DILIGENCE IN THE SPIRIT 
 
 2 Peter i. 5-9 
 
 Yea, and for this very cause adding on your part all 
 diligence, in your faith supply virtue ; and in your virtue 
 knoivledge ; and in your knoivledge temperance; and in 
 your temperance jxitience ; and in your patience godliness ; 
 and in your godliness love of the brethren; and in your 
 love of the brethren love. For if these things are yours and 
 abound, they make you to be not idle nor unfruitful unto 
 the knowledge of our Lord Jesu^ Christ. For he that 
 lacketh these things is blind, seeing only what is near, having 
 forgotten the cleansing from his old sins. 
 
 In our previous meditation we were considering 
 the vast resources which are the inheritance 
 of every believer in Christ Jesus. We gazed 
 upon our bulKon in the bank. We reverently 
 contemplated the '' exceeding great and precious 
 promises," and we bowed in awe before the 
 overwhelming ministry of God's redeeming 
 grace. And now what shall we do with these 
 stupendous resources ? We must not allow the 
 Divine wealth to soothe us into slumberous 
 and perilous impotence. If the Lord makes 
 us to "lie down in green pastures," it is only 
 that by the gracious renewal we might be 
 
 227 
 
228 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 enabled to walk in " the paths of righteousness 
 Verse 5 for His name's sake." Therefore ''''for this very 
 cause add on your part all diligence.''^ It is a 
 demand for business vigilance in the realm of 
 the spirit. "We are not to close our eyes and 
 allow our limbs to hang limp, in the ex- 
 pectancy that the Lord will carry us like blind 
 logs. He made us of clay, but he formed us 
 men, and as men He purposes that we shall 
 live and move and have our being. And so 
 . He calls for " diligence." It is a word which 
 elsewhere is translated haste, carefulness, busi- 
 ness. It is very wonderful how commonly the 
 New Testament takes its similes from the com- 
 mercial world. " Trade ye herewith till I come." 
 " Look therefore carefully how ye walk, buying 
 up the opportunity." " The kingdom of heaven 
 is like unto a merchantman." In all these varied 
 passages there is a common emphasis upon the 
 necessity of businesslike qualities in our spiritual 
 life. We are called upon to manifest the same 
 earnestness, the same intensity, the same 
 strenuousness in the realm of spiritual enter- 
 prise as we do in the search for daily bread. 
 And yet how frequent and glaring is the 
 contrast between a man's religious life and his 
 life in the office or upon the exchange. His 
 life seems to be lived in separate compartments ; 
 the one is suggestive of laxity and a waiting 
 
CHAPTER I. 5-9 229 
 
 upon liappy luck ; the other is characterised 
 by a fiery ardour and keen sagacity. There 
 is method in the office ; there is disorder in 
 the closet. But here, I say, is a demand that 
 men should be as businesslike in winning 
 holiness as in seeking material wealth. "We 
 must bring method into our religion. We must 
 find out the best means of kindling the spirit 
 of praise, and of engaging in quick and cease- 
 less communion with God, and then we must 
 steadily adhere to these as a business man 
 adheres to well-tested systems in commercial 
 life. We must bring alertness into our religion ; 
 we must watch with all the keenness of an 
 open-eyed speculator, and we must be intent 
 upon " buying up every opportunity for the 
 Lord." We must bring promptness into our 
 religion. When some fervent impulse is glow- 
 ing in our spirits we must not play with the 
 treasured moment; "we must strike while the 
 iron is hot." " Now is the accepted time, now 
 is the day of salvation." We must bring bold- 
 ness into our religion. Timid men make no 
 fine ventures. In the realm of religion it is 
 he who ventures most who acquires most. Our 
 weakness lies in our timidity. Great worlds 
 are waiting for us if only we have the courage 
 to go in and possess them. " Why are ye fearful, 
 ye of little faith?" And we must bring 
 
230 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 persistence into our religion. We must not sit 
 down and wail some doleful complaint because 
 the seed sown in the morning did not bring the 
 harvest at night. "We must not encourage a 
 spirit of pessimism because our difficulties appear 
 insuperable. We must go steadily on and wear 
 down every resistance in the grace-fed ex- 
 pectancy that we shall assuredly win if we faint 
 not. Such are the characteristics of common 
 diligence which we are to bring into co-operative 
 fellowship with the forces of grace. " Seest 
 thou a man diligent in his business ? He shall 
 stand before kings; he shall not stand before 
 mean men." 
 
 Assuming, then, that these business qualities 
 and aptitudes are being brought into the 
 ministry of the Spirit, we must now address 
 ourselves to the expansion of our spiritual traffic, 
 to the enrichment of our souls, and the enlarge- 
 erses 5-7 ment of our spiritual stock. " In your faith 
 supply virtue ; and in your virtue knowledge ; and 
 in your knowledge temperance; and in your 
 temperance patience ; and in your patience godli- 
 ness ; and in your godliness love of the brethren; 
 and in your love of the brethren love^ It is surely 
 the addition of ever new departments to the 
 wealthy interests of the soul ! But let us mark 
 that the endeavour after enlargement must have 
 precise and distinctive aim. It is one of the 
 
CHAPTER I. 5-9 231 
 
 perils of the religious life that we so frequently 
 lose ourselves in vague and pointless generalities. 
 Our confessions of sin have no pertinence, and 
 our aspirations after holiness have no shining 
 peaks. We must define our ambitions, and let 
 them glow before us as distinct and radiant 
 goals. It was a wise old monk who wrote, " We 
 must always have some fixed purpose, and 
 especially against those sins which do most of 
 all hinder us." The principle is equally effective 
 and applicable in the pursuit of virtue. What 
 do I lack? Let me examine myself. It will 
 probably be found that the things which most 
 displease me in others are just the things which 
 most characterise myself. Am I impatient? 
 Let me supply it. Do I lack self-control ? Let 
 me supply it. Is my love of the brethren 
 wanting in range ? Let me supply it. But can 
 we supply these additions at will ? Ah, but the 
 writer of this Epistle is not beginning with 
 ethical counsel. He began by taking us round 
 the bank and showing us the mighty resources 
 on which we can draw. And then, after the 
 contemplation of our wealth, he assumes that we 
 are taking possession of it by faith, and that 
 in the strength of that faith we are translating 
 our strength into holy attainment in common 
 life. It is a will that is rooted in God, and from 
 God is drawing the strength it needs, which is 
 
232 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 engaged in this active ministry of adding to 
 its moral and spiritual treasures. And a will 
 so set can attain unto anything, and can become 
 clothed in the superlative beauties of the likeness 
 of Christ. 
 
 But here, now, is a vital principle ; every 
 
 added virtue strengthens and transfigures every 
 
 other virtue. Every addition to character affects 
 
 the colour of the entire character. In Huskin's 
 
 great work of Modern Painters^ he devotes one 
 
 chapter to what he calls " The Law of Help." 
 
 And here is the paragraph in which he defines 
 
 the law : " In true composition, everything else 
 
 not only helps everything else a little, but 
 
 helps it with its utmost power. Every atom is 
 
 full of energy. Not a line, not a speck of colour, 
 
 but is doing its very best, and that best is aid." 
 
 It is even so in the composition of character. 
 
 Every addition I make to my character adds 
 
 to the general enrichment. The principle has 
 
 its reverse application. To withdraw a single 
 
 grace is to impoverish every element in the 
 
 religious life. " For whosoever shall keep the 
 
 whole law, and yet stumble in one point, is 
 
 become guilty of all." We cannot poison the 
 
 blood in one limb without endangering the 
 
 entire circulation. But it is the positive 
 
 application of the principle with which we are 
 
 now concerned. And the graces are a co- 
 
CHAPTER I. 5-9 233 
 
 operative brotherhood, they are interpervasive, 
 and each one lends energy and colour to the 
 whole. We cannot possibly supply a new grace 
 to the life without bringing wealth to all our 
 previous acquirements. For instance, here is 
 *' godliness." Godliness by itself may be very 
 regular, and at the same time very icy and very 
 cold. It is like a room without a fire. But now 
 " in your godliness supply love." And what 
 a difference a fire always makes to a well- 
 furnished room ! Love brings the fire into the 
 cold chamber, and godliness becomes a genial 
 thing with a new glow upon it, and a new 
 geniality at its heart. But the love thus 
 supplied not only enriches godliness, but every 
 other grace as well. What a tenderness it 
 gives to patience, and what a soft beauty 
 it brings to self-control! Take love away 
 from the circle of the graces, and they are 
 like a varied landscape when the sun is hid 
 behind the clouds. " In your faith supply . . . 
 love." And so on, with never-ceasing additions, 
 for ever enriching the entire life of the soul. 
 
 Men who bring such business-like qualities 
 into the sphere of their religion, and who are 
 continually enriching their spiritual stock, make 
 a lasting contribution to the common weal. 
 *' For if these things are yours and abound^ they 
 make you to be not idk nor unfruitful unto the 
 
 Verse 8 
 
234 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christy Such lives 
 are " not idle," they are active ; they are not 
 *' unfruitful," they are efficient. Surely one 
 could not find two words more descriptive of 
 a worthy and positive life ; it is active and 
 efficient. It is active and efficient on the side 
 of reception, the whole life being gloriously 
 open to the incoming of the Divine ; it is active 
 and efficient in the ministry of impartation, 
 communicating itself in rich currency to the 
 interests and affairs of the world. We become 
 the best and the most active and the most 
 efficient citizens when we contribute to the 
 common life the gift of sweet and perfected 
 dispositions. A poor but sanctified life is a 
 magnificent civic asset ! Who can compute 
 the value to a community of a character en- 
 riched by patience, by self-control, by brotherly 
 kindness, and by love ? Such characters are 
 moral health centres ; they bring ozone into 
 the crowded thoroughfares of common life. 
 That is the true efficiency, as indeed that is 
 the true success, which makes an enduring 
 contribution to the common wealth. Such 
 things can never die. 
 
 What then? If we are businesslike, con- 
 tinually adding to our spiritual stock, and 
 thereby contributing to the common weal, what 
 will be the issue? The apostle expresses the 
 
CHAPTER I. 5-9 235 
 
 issue in negation. '' He that lacketh these things Verse 9 
 is hlind.'^ Then if a man possess these things 
 he is consequently endowed with sight. Every 
 supplied grace enlarges the spiritual vision. 
 Every refinement of the disposition is the 
 acquirement of an extra lens. And now I 
 think of it, my text is like a vast drawn-out 
 telescope, with lens after lens added, ever con- 
 tributing to the intensity and extension of its 
 range. See how it runs : " Add virtue, and 
 knowledge, and temperance, and patience, and 
 godliness, and love of the brethren, and love ! " 
 What seeing power a man will gain with a 
 telescope like this! But lacking these things 
 I should only see things that are near, and 
 there will be no distant alluring vision, and 
 every thought will be of the immediate day. 
 Lacking " these things," bread is bread alone ; 
 let these things be added, and our daily bread 
 becomes a sacrament through which we see 
 the very beauty of the Christ. Without " these 
 things," affliction becomes a dark and a heavy 
 deposit ; let " these things," be added, and we 
 can see its issue in " a far more exceeding and 
 eternal weight of glory." Drop " these things," 
 and life becomes a thing of purely transient 
 import, a jostle and a squabble for a slice of 
 bread. Let " these things " be added, and life 
 becomes endowed with eternal significance, and 
 
236 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 every little duty becomes an open gate into 
 the infinite world. And so the apostle con- 
 cludes his exhortation by re-emphasising his 
 Verse 10 kindly and urgent counsel. ^^ Wherefore^ 
 brethren^ give the more diligence^ Let every atom 
 of energy be devoted to your holy cause. 
 Never let your prayers be scrimped and nig- 
 gardly ! Do not enter into life maimed, and so 
 escape corruption by the skin of your teeth! 
 Seek to win life, and to win it well, " for thus 
 shall be richly supplied unto you an entrance 
 into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and 
 Saviour Jesus Christ." 
 
THE SANCTIFICATION OF THE 
 MEMORY 
 
 2 Petee i. 12-15 
 
 Wherefore I shall he ready always to put you in re- 
 membrance of these thiTigs, though ye know them^ and are 
 established in the truth which is with you. And I think 
 it right, as Imig as I am in this tabernacle^ to stir you up 
 by putting you in remembrance ; knowing that the putting 
 off of my tabernacle cometh swiftly, even as our Lord Jesus 
 Christ signified unto me. Yea, I will give diligence that 
 at every time ye may be able after my decease to call these 
 things to remembrance. 
 
 ** 1 shall be ready always to put you in remem- verse 12 
 brance of these things. And what things are 
 these ? We have seen how the earlier counsels 
 of this great chapter are disposed. It is as 
 though we had first a description of rare and 
 fertile soil, and then a catalogue of the mar- 
 vellously bountiful fruits which can be grown 
 in it. Or to change our figure, it is as though 
 the earlier verses are descriptive of every man's 
 banking account, and the later verses point out 
 the possible issues of vigilant and aggressive 
 enterprise. The whole passage begins in the 
 
 237 
 
238 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 general endowment of grace and peace, and it 
 finishes in the glorious possibility of an abun- 
 dant entrance " into the eternal kingdom of our 
 Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." 
 
 ''I shall be ready always to put you in 
 remembrance of these things." It is vital that 
 we remember this connection between soil and 
 fruits, between capital and labour. It is all- 
 important that we hold the apostolic teaching 
 that the Christian gospel is not a theory to be 
 defended, but an inheritance to be explored 
 and enjoyed. The Christian is not first an 
 apologist, or even an evangelist, but an experi- 
 mentalist, dealing personally with the proffered 
 grace and power of his Lord. At every 
 moment the Christian is both passive and 
 active, passively receiving the redemptive 
 power of grace, and actively working it out 
 in rich and perfected character. He is both 
 suppliant and ambassador; he communes with 
 God, he intercedes with man. He is not 
 separately a man of the cloisters or a man of 
 the street; he is both in one. He keeps in 
 touch with the tremendous background of grace 
 in order that he may fill his foreground with 
 the fruits of grace in Christian life and duty. 
 He brings the infinite into the trifle, and he 
 knows that without the powers of eternal 
 salvation he cannot redeem the passing day. 
 
CHAPTER I. 12-15 239 
 
 In a word the Christian takes knowledge of his 
 resources and does not dare to seek to live 
 his life without them. He remembers "these 
 things." 
 
 But is it not a strange thing that we should 
 ever be inclined to forget them ? We should 
 surely assume that whatever other things we 
 might be inclined to forget we should always 
 remember that we are spiritual millionaires. 
 Is it possible that in doing the little business 
 of life we can ever forget our buried capital 
 in the Lord, the treasure laid up for us in 
 heaven, and seek to win spiritual success 
 without it ? Yes, aU this is a grave possibility, 
 and therefore the apostle ardently labours to 
 keep our remembrance alert. Memory is such 
 a child of caprice, even in purely human 
 matters ! The memory is in the habit of 
 playing curious pranks. We can remember 
 people's faces, but we forget their names. 
 We remember a story, but we forget its date. 
 We can repeat all the marriage relationships 
 of the royal house, but we forget the steps of 
 even a short argument. We can recall the 
 unessential, and we forget the fundamental. 
 " Memory is a capricious witch ; she husbands 
 bits of straw and rag, and throws her jewels 
 out of the window." And certainly in higher 
 relationships our memory gives us no better 
 
240 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 service. We remember a single injury and 
 we forget a multitude of gracious benefits. We 
 remember material experiences and incidents, 
 but we forget the things which most p]«^ofoundly 
 concern our peace. There is therefore surely 
 great need for the strenuous word of the 
 apostle. And it is as urgent upon us as upon 
 the men and women of his own day that we 
 vigorously set about to exercise and sanctify 
 the powers of our remembrance. 
 
 Now, what can we say about it ? Let us 
 begin here. The intensity of our remembrance 
 very largely depends upon the depth of the 
 original impressions. Some incidents bite deep 
 into the mind, like acid into metal ; they are not 
 printed, but graven ; not written, but burned. 
 Other impressions are like the writing upon 
 the steamed window-panes of a railway carriage ; 
 let the outside atmosphere get a little warmer 
 and they pass away in an hour. Now the 
 depth of the impression is determined by the 
 vividness of the vision. If our gaze is cursory 
 the impression will be transient. How does all 
 this bear upon our remembrance in the spirit ? 
 It has this most crucial bearing ; our impressions 
 are fleeting because we do not give sufficient 
 time to receive them. The vision does not 
 bite! What can a man know of the country 
 of Uganda by careering through it in a railway 
 
CHAPTER I. 12-15 241 
 
 train? What can a man know of the wealth 
 and glory of our National Gallery if he takes 
 the chambers at a gallop ? If he is to retain a 
 lasting and a vivid remembrance he must sit 
 down before one of the masterpieces, and allow 
 himself to steep in the contemplation of its 
 glory. It is quite impossible to take a snapshot 
 of the interior of a cathedral. If the exquisite 
 tracery, and even the dim outlines of the 
 structure, are to be captured, it will be done as 
 the issue of a long exposure. And so it is with 
 the vastness of our inheritance in Christ. Our 
 visions come from long exposures ; we have 
 got to sit down reverently and gaze upon the 
 glory of the Lord in prolonged contemplation. 
 "We sometimes sing, " There is life for a look 
 at the Crucified One ! " That is scarcely true if 
 by look we mean a transient glance, a passing 
 nod, a momentary turning of the eyes. " There 
 is life for a gaze^^^ and that life is continuous 
 only so long as the gaze is retained. If we only 
 glance upon the Master we shall forget the 
 impression at the next turning of the way ; the 
 enemy will come, and will snatch away that 
 which was sown in our hearts. The strength 
 of our memory depends upon the depth of our 
 impressions. 
 
 It is equally true that the intensity of the 
 remembrance also depends upon the studied 
 
242 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 preservation of the impressions. There are 
 forces ever about us that minister to erasion 
 and oblivion. I noticed the other day that the 
 workmen were engaged upon a very conspicuous 
 monument in London, deepening the inscriptive 
 letters which told the heroic story. The cor- 
 rosives of time had been at work upon the once 
 deep impressions, and they were being gradually 
 effaced. And so it is with the lines in our 
 memory ; time is hostile to their retention, and 
 is ever at work seeking their effacement. And 
 so the impressions need to be periodically 
 deepened and revived. Have we any ministries 
 for effecting this purpose? Yes, I think we 
 have many. A ^kce can do it. If you go back 
 to the little village where you spent your early 
 days, how the old life comes back to you as you 
 tread the accustomed ways and turn the familiar 
 corners ! How the sight of an old well can 
 recall an experience, and even a drop upon the 
 bucket can revive feelings which carry you back 
 to your youth. And a place can sometimes 
 refresh and deepen a spiritual impression. I 
 wonder if Simon Peter ever went back to the 
 court of the High Priest's palace ! I warrant 
 he never passed near the door without the 
 fountain of tears being unsealed, and the stream 
 of penitential feelings flowing anew. There 
 was a littlo place in a garden to which Thomas 
 
CHAPTER I. 12-15 243 
 
 Boston used to repair whenever lie wanted to 
 quicken his early love for the Lord. It was 
 his spiritual birthplace, and the very place 
 seemed to abound in the ministry of regenera- 
 tion. It would be an amazingly fruitful thing 
 if some of my readers, whose spiritual fervour 
 is growing cool, and whose early conception of 
 the Lord is becoming faint, would spare a day 
 to go to the place where first they knew the 
 Lord, and I warrant that the sacred spot would 
 re-deepen the lines of their early covenant, and 
 they would find themselves revived. It would 
 be a great day in many a man's life if he would 
 go back to the little village church, and sit for 
 one Sunday in the seat which he occupied when 
 there broke upon his wonderings eyes the 
 vision of the glory of his Lord. For a place 
 can renew the lines of our remembrances. 
 
 And a thiTig can do it. An apparently com- 
 monplace thing can recall a conspicuous history. 
 I have known the scent of a flower unveil a day 
 which seemed to have been buried in permanent 
 obscurity. I never get the fragrance of the 
 common dog-rose without my memory leaping 
 back to an old-fashioned garden in the North, 
 and peopling that garden with presences now 
 gone, and awaking experiences which are preg- 
 nant with inspiration and peace. But the 
 principle has higher applications still. A piece 
 
244 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 of broken bread can recall the broken body of 
 the Lord, and a cup of wine can become the 
 sacramental minister of the blood of the Lamb. 
 Can we afford to forget these helpmeets of 
 grace ? Even the superlative verities of our 
 faith sometimes grow dim to our eyes, and we 
 temporarily lose our hold upon them. Let us 
 make use of every means appointed by the 
 Lord, if perchance our memory may be revived 
 and these fruitful sanctities may be retained. 
 
 When I survey the wondrous Cross 
 On which the Prince of Glory died, 
 
 My richest gain I count but loss, 
 And pour contempt on all my pride. 
 
 An incident can do it. How frequently it 
 happens that the hands busy themselves in 
 doing a thing which has not been done for 
 many years, and the little action draws the 
 curtain back from our youth. I played a little 
 game the other day which I had not played 
 since boyhood, and in very literal feeling I 
 was a boy again, and all the past environ- 
 ments round about my feet. And it is even 
 so with activity of a higher kind. That bit of 
 Christian work you dropped, and the dropping 
 of which has brought such a heavy penalty of 
 spiritual degeneracy and recoil ! Take it up 
 again! Your Lord's grace was very real to 
 you then ! Take it up again, and you will find 
 
CHAPTER I. 12-15 245 
 
 tliat in that God-blessed work your remembrance 
 is revived, the effaced impressions have deepened 
 again, and you have the old inspired vision of 
 the glory of the Lord. Go to it again, I say, 
 and your soul shall be restored. In all these 
 ways, by a diligent determination to give our- 
 selves time to receive our spiritual impressions, 
 and by cherishing all the ministries by which 
 the impressions can be preserved, it is possible 
 to sanctify our memories and to make them 
 temples of the living God. 
 
 But in our text the apostle puts himself 
 forward as a helpmeet of other men's remem- 
 brances. " / shall be ready always to put you in Verse 12 
 remembrance of these things.'^ It is a gracious 
 prerogative that we can minister to one another 
 in holy things. It is possible for one man to 
 rouse another man's memory to the recollection 
 of the things of the Spirit, and to revive his sense 
 of the superlative grace and goodness of God. 
 But this ministry of remembrancer is one that 
 requires the utmost delicacy if its exercise is 
 to be hallowed and fruitful. The phrase in my 
 text, "to put you in remembrance," literally 
 signifies to remind quietly, to mention it under 
 one's breath, to gently suggest it! There are 
 two ways of performing the function of re- 
 membrancer. We can approach our brother 
 like an alarm bell, or we can bear upon him 
 
246 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEB 
 
 like a genial breathing. "We can rouse some 
 people quite easily by drawing up tlie blinds 
 and letting in the light. There is no occasion 
 for the rattle of artillery ; it is quite enough 
 to let the sunshine in. And there are some 
 men who seem to be spiritually slumberous who 
 do not require some angry indictment, but only 
 a gentle hint of spiritual resource. Here is a 
 man who is down ; his troubles have multiplied 
 on every hand; and in the depth of the de- 
 pression he has forgotten everything but the 
 calamity itself. Now here is an opportunity for 
 the Lord's remembrancer ! But how unwise it 
 would be to come with all the clatter of a fire- 
 engine, and the accompaniment of a clanging, 
 rousing bell. The only effective approach would 
 be one of exquisite delicacy. We must approach 
 the man as a nurse would touch a patient who is 
 full of sores, and in tones of the softest com- 
 passion we must remind him that he is a 
 millionaire, and that he has untold capital in 
 the bank of the Lord. But, oh, the tact of it ! 
 See that fine touch in the apostle's ministry : 
 " I shall be ready always to put you in remem- 
 Verse 12 brance . . . though ye know them.'" How delicate 
 . the courtesy ! ''I have nothing new to tell you, 
 but you and I have both got the Lord, haven't 
 Ave ? " I say the delicacy of it ; it Vv^as the very 
 inspiration of the Holy Ghost. "It shall be 
 
CHAPTER I. 12-15 247 
 
 given you in that same hour what ye shall 
 speak." 
 
 And this ministry of remembrancer is one that 
 must not be delayed. The man's memory is 
 getting numb. His early spiritual impressions 
 are being effaced. The glory of the Lord is 
 waning. The distant heaven is growing dim. 
 Let not the remembrancer wait ; let him set 
 about his Christlike work in the assurance that 
 the King's business requireth haste. ''I think 
 it right . . . knowing that the putting off of my Verges 
 tabernacle cometh siviftlyJ^ The remembrancer ' 
 himself is only here for a time: he has but a 
 day at the most : let him be up and about ! 
 The night cometh ! But how beautiful the 
 apostle's conception of the coming night ! Life 
 is a pilgrimage in tents, and to-morrow he will 
 pull up the tent-pegs and depart to "the city 
 that hath foundations." But meanwhile he 
 must be active, deepening the lines in the 
 memory of his fellow-disciples. " Yea^ I will give Verse 15 
 diligence that at every time ye may he able after 
 my decease to call these things to remembrance^^ 
 He wiU do something to ensure the continuance 
 of his ministry, even when he has gone home. 
 " After my decease ! " After my exodus ! "When 
 he has left his Egypt and found his Canaan, the 
 far-off land across the Jordan, the ministry of 
 remembrancer shall be maintained. I think that 
 
248 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 every time they recalled tlie apostle, when he had 
 gone home, the very memory would act as a 
 restorative of their own spiritual experiences, 
 and the depth of their early devotion would 
 be regained. 
 
 Let us reverently and diligently see to the 
 sanctification of our memories. Let us periodi- 
 cally inspect our impressions. Let us watch if 
 we are in any way forgetful of our spiritual 
 inheritance. Are we remembering our capital ? 
 Do we look like millionaires, or are we like 
 beggars whose memories have utterly lost the 
 significance of their grand estate ? Lord, help 
 us to remember what we ought never to forget ! 
 
THE TEANSFIGUEED JESUS 
 
 2 Peter i. 16-18 
 
 For we did not follow cunningly devised fables^ when we 
 made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord 
 Jesus Christy hut we were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For 
 He received from God the Father honour and glory, when 
 there came such a voice to Him from the excellent glory^ 
 This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased : and 
 this voice we ourselves heard come out of heaven, when we 
 were with Him in the holy mount. 
 
 " We were eyewitnesses of His majesty " — eyewit- verse 16 
 nesses of the mystic glory in which the Lord 
 was arrayed, and by which He was possessed 
 upon the Mount of TransjBguration. The passage 
 has reference to the superlative splendour which 
 shone about the Lord upon what we call the 
 " Mount of Transfiguration." " We were eye- 
 witnesses of His majesty." When I had written 
 that phrase upon my paper I looked up at my 
 study walls, and I caught sight of Munkacsy's 
 great picture of " Christ before Pilate," and the 
 contrast between the mount of glory, when the 
 majesty of the Lord was witnessed by the 
 apostles, and the shame and the ignominy of 
 249 
 
250 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the judgment liall, was to me positively startling. 
 " We were eyewitnesses of His majesty." I 
 looked at tlie picture, and there was Pilate, 
 bullet-headed, with short-cropped hair, with 
 lustreless eyes, with effeminate mouth, and a 
 most irresolute chin — Pilate, clothed in the 
 garment of a little brief authority, disposing of 
 the Maker of the world. And then the crowd ! 
 Fierce men with clenched fists in an attitude of 
 threatening ; faces made repulsive by passion ; 
 Pharisees in long, tasselled garments, yelling 
 " Crucify Him, crucify Him ! " other Pharisees 
 bowing before the Lord in profound but mock 
 obeisance ; other Pharisees, with curling lips of 
 scorn and contempt, looking on with sheer 
 disdain ; two or three women, with babes in 
 their arms, gazing with the fascination of terror ; 
 one woman fainting, supported by a man who 
 has the only gentle face in the crowd ; and 
 there, hiding in the very thick of the fierce 
 mob, Judas Iscariot, with a face all alert with 
 fear, and eyes in which there is already visible 
 the flame of remorse ; and added to all this a 
 ring of impassive Roman soldiers, and one or 
 two wondering little children, and a stray, 
 terrified dog ! And before all this mass of 
 yelling and blood-seeking fanatics there stands 
 the Lord ! Upon His exposed breast there are 
 the weals of the scourge. The plait of thorns 
 
CHAPTER I. 16-18 251 
 
 is crushed down upon His brow ; His hands are 
 manacled ; they bear the reed, the mock symbol 
 of sovereignty ; His face is perfectly white, 
 wearied, sorrow-stricken, and yet there is an 
 upward look, as though His eyes were piercing 
 the gloom. Yes, I say, I looked at that when 
 I read Peter's words, " We were eyewitnesses 
 of His majesty " ; and I say the contrast was 
 perfectly startling, for there seemed to be little 
 radiance or glory as He stood there, bound and 
 helpless, the victim of the tyrannous crowd. 
 But, in reality, is the radiance of the transfigura- 
 tion in any way dimmed by the ignominy and 
 the tragedy of the later days ? Has the glory 
 which shone upon the mount been in any way 
 eclipsed by what is now taking place before 
 Pilate? By no means. In Pilate's judgment- 
 hall the glory and majesty of the Lord had not 
 departed ; and it came to me, and I knew it as 
 I gazed upon the picture in my study, that 
 somehow that picture of the tragedy had to 
 help me to explain the Transfiguration. The 
 Transfiguration upon the Mount finds its ex- 
 planation in the Passion. 
 
 What preceded the journey up the mount ? 
 What had taken place before the disciples and 
 the Lord took their journey away to the mount ? 
 Can we get at their mind? If I may use a 
 somewhat common phrase to-day, what was 
 
252 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 their " psychological mood " ? What was their 
 mental content when they began to climb the 
 hill ? "What had been the last emphasis of the 
 Master's teaching ? Had they any fear ? Had 
 they any special hope ? How had they begun 
 to climb the mount with Jesus ? What were 
 the last things in His private expositions which 
 probably filled their minds ? Happily fo ' you 
 and for me the matter is made perfectly clear. 
 The very last thing we are told about our Lord's 
 converse with His disciples is this : a little while 
 before, and for the first time, the shadow of the 
 Lord's death was flung upon their sunlit and 
 prosperous way. " From that time " — this was 
 only just before the climb began — " From that 
 time began Jesus to shew unto His disciples 
 how that He must go unto Jerusalem and suffer 
 many things of the elders and chief priests and 
 scribes, and be killed." I want you to think of 
 that as suddenly entering into the programme. 
 It had never been whispered before, and now, 
 when the way was becoming more and more 
 sunny, and the crowds becoming more and more 
 loyal and multiplied, when the day was just 
 dawning, and the Lord's kingdom just appearing, 
 He begins to talk about His own suffering and 
 death. I do not wonder that the announcement 
 from the Master's lips startled and staggered 
 and paralysed them= Why, the teaching 
 
CHAPTER I. 16-18 253 
 
 darkened the whole prospect ! " That shall 
 never be unto Thee, Lord," cried the ardent 
 and impulsive Peter. " Get thee behind 
 Me ! " I think there is no preacher who 
 can say that word in the Master's tones, " Get 
 thee behind Me ! " It was not said in savage 
 severity, but in the pleadings of love. He felt 
 the allurement of the disciple's words, "That 
 shall never be unto Thee, Lord ! " " Don't, 
 don't. My beloved friend ! Tempt Me not away 
 from the gloom ; thy friendship is seeking the 
 victory of the evil one." And then He gathered 
 them round about Him and began to expound 
 unto them the law of life. " Whosoever will 
 take thy way, Peter, whosoever will save his 
 life shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his life 
 shall find it." He began to expound unto them 
 the law of life through death, fulness through 
 sacrifice. If we would live we must die ; if we 
 would find ourselves we must give ourselves 
 away. He began to say unto them that He 
 would suffer and be killed ! And then He laid 
 down for them the great condition of fellow- 
 ship : " If any man would come after Me, let 
 him deny himself, and take up his cross and 
 foUow Me." 
 
 Well now, that is the mental furniture, that 
 is the psychological mood which possessed the 
 disciples as they turned to climb the slopes of 
 
254 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the mount. They were under the shadow ! To 
 them had just been made a suggestion of the 
 coming death of their King. They had had 
 teaching about crosses, and losses, and sacrifice ; 
 and yet, through it all, a wonderful promise 
 woven of ultimate victory. We must go back 
 to that word about the cross, and self-denial, 
 and the law of life; and when we climb 
 the mount of transfiguration we must take it 
 as a key to the glory, and to all that awaits 
 us there. 
 
 " And then," we are told, " Jesus taketh with 
 
 him Peter," with his mind filled with these 
 
 things, "and James," and his mind filled with 
 
 these things, "and John." "Jesus taketh V 
 
 That word "taketh" is an exceedingly feeble 
 
 and unsuggestive English word. The word that 
 
 lies behind it is full of pregnant significance. It 
 
 is precisely the same word which, in the Epistle 
 
 to the Hebrews, is translated "offered." "He 
 
 taketh with him." It is not an ordinary journey. 
 
 It is the solemn beginning of a walk which is 
 
 to end at an altar, and that an altar of sacrifice. 
 
 "He taketh with Him Peter, and James and 
 
 John," and they begin the solemn walk leading 
 
 them up to the great surrender, the place of 
 
 glorious sacrifice. " He taketh them into a high 
 
 mountain, apart," and this too, in the evening 
 
 time. Let us pause there for a moment. There 
 
CHAPTER I. 16-18 255 
 
 is always sometlimg so solemnising about the 
 evening. 
 
 Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, 
 And all the air a solemn stillness holds. 
 
 Somehow in the gathering twilight God seems to 
 come very near. And this experience receives em- 
 phasis when it is evening time upon the heights, 
 when the clouds are coming back like tired 
 vagrants to rest awhile upon the summits ; when 
 there is nobody near, and nobody can be heard, 
 except, perhaps, some belated shepherd, gather- 
 ing his flock together for the night. He led them 
 unto a mountain apart, " and He prayed." Let 
 us get the scene well fixed in our imaginations. 
 The Master is away up in the mountain ; the 
 heavy dews are lying upon the grass: that 
 breeze is softly blowing, the breeze which seems 
 to be always moving upon the lower slopes of 
 Hermon, perhaps cooled by the snows beyond. 
 And there He kneels, the Master, the Lord, and 
 He prays ! I want us to realise that all prayer is 
 more than speech with God. Prayer is infinitely 
 more than pleading. I sometimes wish— I say 
 it with the utmost deliberateness — I sometimes 
 wish we could drop the word " plead " quite 
 out of our religious vocabulary. We so fre- 
 quently pray as though we had got an indifferent 
 and unwilling God with whom we have to plead. 
 
256 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEB, 
 
 The cardinal necessity in prayer is not pleading 
 but receiving. I do not believe — I say it witL 
 a full sense of responsibility — I do not believe 
 we have any more need to plead with God to 
 bless than to plead with the air outside to come 
 into a building. It is not so much pleading that 
 is required as the making of an inlet. God is 
 willing. Prayer is simply communion ; the 
 opening up of channels of companionship ; the 
 opening out of mind, the opening out of will, 
 in order that into the open mind and will and 
 conscience there may flow the Divine energy 
 and the Divine grace. " Jesus prayed," and I 
 know that when it is said " Jesus prayed," it 
 means that He was absolutely open to the 
 infinite. Surely that is the meaning of prayer. 
 AVhen a man prays, if he prays aright, he is 
 simply opening himself out to the incoming of 
 God. God says: "Behold! I stand at the door 
 and knock ; I enshrine and surround you like 
 the atmosphere." Prayer is conscious receptive- 
 ness in the presence of the Divine. Jesus, upon 
 the mountain height, in the evening time prayed, 
 He opened Himself to God, the Infinite, and the 
 Infinite began to possess Him. 
 
 "And as He prayed He was transfigured." I 
 am not surprised at that. Even among men we 
 have seen the ministry of transfiguration, even 
 though it be in infinitely smaller degree. You 
 
CHAPTER I. 16-18 257 
 
 remember that Moses had been so opened out 
 to God, and so possessed by the Divine Hght, 
 that when he came down from the mount his 
 face shone with mystic radiance. We are told 
 concerning Stephen that he was so opened out 
 to the Infinite that they saw his face as it had 
 been the face of an angel. He was simply 
 possessed and pervaded by the Divine power. 
 And surely one may say, as I can say, that in 
 far humbler life than that of Moses, in life in 
 which there has been little of what the world 
 calls " culture," little of mental furniture, little 
 of dialectical power, but in which there has been 
 great spiritual receptiveness, in the lives of the 
 illiterate there has shone '' a light that never 
 was on sea or land." But here with the Master, 
 whose life was absolutely and uninterruptedly 
 opened out to the glory of the God-head, the 
 inflow of glory transfigured and transformed 
 Him, and in superlative and supreme degree 
 ^' His face did shine as the sun." The very 
 expression of His countenance was altered. And 
 then the historians go even further, for we are 
 told that the glory, the energy, I scarcely know 
 how to describe it — one uses an almost violent 
 phrase in seeking to give expression to it — the 
 Divine effluence which flowed into the Lord not 
 only transfigured His flesh, but in some mystio 
 way transfigured even His outer vesture. " His 
 
258 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 garments became white as snow." All of which 
 just means this : that this man of Nazareth 
 became so absolutely filled with God that His 
 very material vesture was transfigured and 
 transformed. " We were eyewitnesses of it." 
 
 Now, I would like to pause there a moment, 
 to offer an opinion for which I cannot quote 
 Scriptural authority. '' This say I, not the 
 Lord." I would venture to ask: What would 
 have happened if man had never sinned? I 
 think, just what happened on the mount. I have 
 a conviction that this experience on the mount 
 was just the purposed consummation for every 
 life. I have a conviction that if there had 
 been no sin you and I would never have known 
 an open grave. We should have known a 
 transformation, a transfiguration ; there would 
 have been , a consummation in which the 
 material would have been transfigured and 
 trai.sformed through the importation of the 
 Divine glory. The corruptible would have put 
 on incorruption, but not through the ministry 
 of decay and death; just by the ministry of 
 an inflow of Divine glory. I think that was 
 our purposed end, and our purposed glory. I 
 think that from the very day of our birth our 
 road would have led ever forward and ever 
 forward into light. There would have come 
 a certain moment in the temporal life of 
 
CHAPTER I. 16-18 259 
 
 everybody when the glory of the Lord would 
 have absolutely possessed us, when the material 
 shrme would have been transfigured, and we 
 should have reached the higher plane of the 
 immortal life. But sin came, and that con- 
 summation could never be. Instead of on some 
 quiet evening just being transfigured into the 
 immortal, we have now to take the way to 
 the shades, the way of the grave. But Jesus 
 never sinned, and therefore I think that upon 
 the mount His life was naturally consummated, 
 and He could have entered into the permanent 
 glory which then possessed Him. 
 
 But now, mark you, I say that our Master, 
 with a perfectly holy life, came there to a 
 natural consummation, in which His life was 
 transfigured, and He might, I think, then 
 have passed into the state of enduring glory. 
 But He divests Himself of the glory, lays 
 it aside, turns His back, as it were, upon 
 the natural consummation, and takes the way 
 to the grave. He turns from the appointed 
 way of glory, the glory of sinlessness, and He 
 takes the way appointed of sin. That is what 
 I call the great renunciation ; and I sometimes 
 think that instead of calling it the Mount of 
 Transfiguration we might call it the Mount 
 of Renunciation. He would not claim the 
 natural consummation. He would not claim 
 
260 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 the transfiguration. He takes up tlie cross 
 even upon the mount ; He takes the way of 
 His brethren in sin ; He came to do it ; He 
 leaves the glory, and He comes down the mount 
 that by coming down the mount He might 
 make for you and for me a new and living 
 way by which we, too, can reach the con- 
 summation. " See, He lays His glory by ! " He 
 turns His face towards the grave. 
 
 Do you think there were no fears in His 
 renunciation ?' I very frequently wish that we 
 did not so divest our Lord of all attributes 
 common to the flesh. Do you think our Master 
 was altogether delivered from the common fears 
 of man in the prospect of death ? No fear of 
 death, and that a death of such absolute 
 abandonment, and of so unspeakable and un- 
 thinkable isolation ? I think when He turned 
 His back upon that glory, glory to which He 
 had a right, and faced towards the grave, He 
 felt a chill, the chill of a nameless fear. I know 
 that on another mountain, when the devil came 
 and tempted Him, and He then turned His 
 back upon the offered sovereignty, " angels 
 came and ministered unto Him." And I do 
 not wonder that now, when, upon the mount 
 of another renunciation. He turns His back 
 upon the glory and contemplates death, there 
 appeared unto Him two other ministers — Moses 
 
CHAPTEE, I. 16-18 261 
 
 and Elijali : Moses who died no one knew how, 
 and was buried no one knew where ; and Elijah, 
 who was transfigured that he should not see 
 death. And then we are told in just one phrase, 
 which although it does not satisfy, yet relieves 
 our Avonder, that they spoke together of the 
 decease that He should accomplish at Jerusalem. 
 Perhaps it is permitted us to indulge in a little 
 reverent imagination ? Here is the Lord turning 
 His back upon glory and facing the chills of 
 death, and there appears to Him from the other 
 side of death Moses and Elijah, and surely 
 their conversation about His decease would be 
 heartening ! It would be feeding speech, and 
 sustaining speech, by which He would be able 
 all the more boldly and all the more fearlessly 
 to take His journey into twilight and night. 
 And so, I say, our Saviour began His descent 
 from glory to grave. It is not the going up 
 the mount that cheers me, it is the coming 
 down ! Every step He took in that descent 
 gives confirmation to your hope and to mine. 
 Our ascent becomes possible in His descent. 
 
 And as He turned to go, and laid His shining 
 glory by, behold ! a voice, " This is My beloved Verse 17 
 Son.'' It was a great renunciation on Chrict's 
 part, but it was a great gift on God's part and 
 I think that on the mount of renunciation, when 
 our Lord begins His descent, and the Father 
 
262 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 says, ''My beloved Son," we can in all rever- 
 ence and truth add the other great word : " God 
 so loved the world that He let Him lay His 
 glory by"; ''God so loved the world that 
 He gave His only begotten Son." Down the 
 mount He comes, on to Golgotha and the grave ! 
 Did not I say that the Transfiguration finds its 
 explanation at the Passion ? When I see Him 
 coming down the mount, I can say with Paul, 
 "He loved me and gave Himself for me." It 
 is through our Lord's renunciation of glory that 
 we become glorified. When I turn my face to 
 the mountain-height, where the Apostle Peter 
 was an eyewitness of the majesty of God, and 
 when I think that that glory was the purposed 
 consummation for every life, that I, if I had 
 never sinned, might have been similarly trans- 
 figured into the immortal state, I wonder how 
 the blest estate can be regained. And here is 
 the answer : 
 
 There is a way for man to rise 
 
 To that sublime abode : 
 An offering and a sacrifice, 
 A Holy Spirit's energies, 
 
 An advocate with God. 
 
 These, these prepare us for the sight 
 
 Of holiness above ; 
 The sons of ignorance and night 
 May dwell in the eternal Light 
 
 Through the eternal Love! 
 
THE MYSTERY OF THE PEOPHET 
 
 2 Peter i. 19-21 
 
 Afid we have the word of jprophecy made more sure; 
 whereunto ye do well that ye take heed^ as nnto a lamp 
 shining in a squalid place^ until the day datvn, and the 
 day-star arise in your hearts : hnoiving this first^ that no 
 prophecy of Scripture is of private interpretation. For no 
 prophecy ever came hy the will of man: hut men spake 
 from God, being moved hy the Holy Ghost. 
 
 The prophet, his prophecy, how to understand 
 it ! This passage is about as compact and con- 
 centrated as a crystal. It is compressed and 
 solidified thinking, every sentence being as 
 essential and as unwasteful as a passage of 
 Browning. Just cast a glance at the crowded 
 contents. I say it enshrines a description of the 
 true prophet, it unveils the nature and signifi- 
 cance of true prophecy, and it defines the only 
 methods by which the secrets of prophecy can 
 be disentangled and understood. Here is the 
 vignette of the prophet : " iVo prophecy ever came Verse 21 
 by the will of man : but m.en spake from Godj being 
 moved by the Holy Ghost J ^ And here is the out- 
 line, the primary feature of prophetic ministry : 
 
 263 
 
264 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 Verse 19 '' A lamp shining in a squalid place, until the day 
 dawn, and the day-star arise in your hearts.'^ 
 And here is the clue to sound and effective 
 Vers^es interpretation of prophecy: '' No prophecy . . . 
 is of private interpretation, for . . , men spake 
 from God,'' These great guiding lines have not 
 become confused by the march of time ; they are 
 as true and significant to-day as on the day 
 when they were first penned, and if we would 
 know a modern prophet when he appears, and 
 be able to understand his message when we 
 hear it, we shall do well to pay close and 
 reverent heed to the teaching of this glorious 
 and inspired companion of our Lord. 
 
 Well, now, I think it is quite as well at once, 
 when we are speaking about prophets and 
 prophecy, that we detach ourselves almost 
 entirely from the modern and popular interpre- 
 tation of the word. Prophecy is not synonymous 
 with prediction. When we use the sentence 
 which has almost become a proverbial phrase 
 in our ordinary speech and say, " I am neither 
 a prophet nor the son of a prophet," we are 
 employing the words almost entirely in the 
 sense of forecast, in the meaning of prevision, 
 with the significance of unbosoming the secrets 
 of the morrow. The element of prevision and 
 of forecast is not entirely absent from the true 
 equipment of the prophet, but it is not the 
 
CHAPTER I. 19-21 2G5 
 
 primary element. I do not think any one can 
 declare principles without forecasting issues ; 
 but the burden of a true prophet is not the fore- 
 casting of an event, but the proclamation of a 
 principle. True prophecy is declaration, not 
 anticipation ; it is vision, not prevision. A 
 prophet is a man who foretells, but who primarily 
 forthtells, tells forth a message which God has 
 given to him. The prophet is a forthteller of 
 great truths, of dominant principles ; he is a re- 
 vealer of the great broad highways along which 
 all the affairs of men move to inevitable destiny. 
 I want, then, at once to put that primary meaning 
 which we use in our modern interpretation of 
 the word on one side, and as far as possible to 
 leave aside this secondary element of prevision. 
 With this introductory assumption, look at the 
 picture of the prophet himself. ^^ No prophecy Yeise 2\ 
 ever came by the ivill of manJ'' Some things may 
 come by human volition, but never prophecy. 
 No man can will himself into the prophetic 
 office. If he is not born there, his presence is an 
 impertinent usurpation. The prophet is not the 
 product of self-will, not the product of self- 
 initiative. He is not the matured flower of 
 human culture. The prophet's own will has little 
 or no part in his mission or vocation. He is 
 not a cause, he is an effect. He is not the wind, 
 he is an instrument, He is not the sun, he is 
 
266 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 a reflector. The prophet is born, not made 
 No prophecy and no prophet ever came by the 
 will of man. The prophet's role is not the 
 perquisite of resolute purpose, or the prize of 
 any strenuous ambition. He does not come by 
 culture, but by nature. He is not made by 
 struggle, he comes by birth. There is about 
 the prophet an element which can never be 
 manufactured. I think we know this deep, 
 unnatural, unearthly, uncreated element in 
 other spheres whenever a prophet appears. We 
 can make rhymesters; we can easily manufac- 
 ture them by the score. You can lay down a 
 number of precise little rules for the making of 
 a versifier ; you can tell him how to measure 
 out his little lines, how to regulate his metre, 
 how to appoint his jingle. You can make 
 a rhymester, but no poetry ever came by the 
 will of man. When you are reading Wordsworth, 
 you can instinctively feel when the manufac- 
 ture begins, you can instinctively feel when 
 the will of the poet begins to work, and you 
 can instinctively feel when the manufacture 
 ceases and something mysterious arrives, and 
 the poet begins to sing. You can make 
 politicians, make them by the crowd. Give a 
 man a little programme, a glib tongue, a strong 
 tincture of party loyalty, and there you are ! 
 But statesmanship never came by the will of 
 
CHAPTEE I. 19-21 267 
 
 man. "We know the distinction between the 
 political party-hack in all our political parties, 
 and the man who tells forth the fundamentals, 
 who speaks not in the mere party tone, but 
 in the abiding speech of the ages. "We can 
 manufacture a politician ; a statesman is beyond 
 us. We can manufacture pianolas, we can 
 make admirable imitations of the human fingers ; 
 we can endow the hammers with something of 
 the living touch of the finger-tips, we can create 
 a most elaborate and exquisite mechanism; but 
 when we have finished our work we experience 
 some nameless chill in the absence of mysterious 
 life. No musician ever came by the will of 
 man. We have to await his coming, and when 
 he comes we know him by the unearthliness of 
 his gifts, and the strains that breathe of another 
 and a mysterious clime. And so I say we are 
 conscious of this unmistakable element when- 
 ever the prophet appears, in whatsoever guise 
 he comes. " Deep calleth unto deep " ; there is 
 about him a suggestion of the infinite, and we 
 cannot explain him. We may not like him. It 
 is quite probable we shall set about and crucify 
 him. But there is in the prophet an element 
 of mysteriousness which, though he be of our 
 flesh and blood, links him with beings of 
 quite another plane. We may not be able 
 to define his distinction, but we feel it ; and 
 
268 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 in these high matters of refined sentiment, 
 feeling is perhaps our safest guide. "Who 
 does not feel the difference between Cecil 
 Ehodes and Garibaldi? It is the unearthly 
 element to which we pay our homage and our 
 regard. Who does not feel the difference 
 between John Bright and Benjamin Disraeli ? 
 What is it ? It is the element that never came 
 by the will of man. It is the difference between 
 a spring and a cistern; it is the difference 
 between glitter and glow ; it is a difference 
 unspeakable, made by the profound and mystic 
 forthtelling from the Infinite. It is even so in 
 every prophet, no matter what may be the 
 garb he wears. It is so in Eudyard Kipling. 
 I think his poetry is often feverish ; to me, at 
 any rate, it is often declamatory, sometimes 
 inflammatory, often thoughtless. But again 
 and again on the heedless page a wind springs 
 up, and everything quickens, and the man is 
 clothed in nameless inspiration, and the mortal 
 puts on immortality. I say we feel it. " The 
 wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest 
 the sound thereof," and it makes one man a 
 statesman and leaves another a politician; it 
 makes one man a poet, and leaves another a 
 rhymester; it makes one man a prophet, and 
 leaves another a mere speaker. " The wind 
 bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest 
 
CHAPTER I. 19-21 269 
 
 the sound thereof," but thou canst not tell 
 whence it cometh, nor whither it goeth." " No 
 prophet ever came by the will of man." We 
 cannot make them. What then? What sug- 
 gestion does the apostle give us in my text as 
 to how this indefinable and mysterious element 
 can be explained? Here is the apostolic ex- 
 planation : " Men spake from God, being moved Verse 21 
 by the Holy GhosV 1 like that word "moved." 
 It is one of the picturesque words of the New 
 Testament Scriptures. It is precisely the same 
 word which is translated in the Acts of the 
 Apostles " drive." You remember in that 
 graphic chapter which describes the shipwreck 
 of the apostle, there comes this very suggestive 
 phrase : " And when the ship was caught . . , 
 we let her drivel That is precisely the word 
 which is here translated " moved." " Men spake 
 from God, being moved,^^ driven by the Holy 
 Ghost as Paul's ship was driven by the wind. 
 That is the apostolic explanation of the prophet. 
 " Suddenly there came a rushing mighty wind," 
 and they spake ! It was so with Moses, it was 
 so with Elijah and Micah and Amos. They 
 were all wind-swept children of God, driven 
 by mysterious currents which they could never 
 explain. That is why prophets can never 
 understand the genesis of their own mission 
 and their own message — they seem to have 
 
270 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 had notlimg to do with it : Why Thackeray, 
 who was sometimes endowed with the prophetic 
 calling, speaking about his highest work, those 
 parts of his work which bore the signs of 
 inspiration, uses these very strange words, " I 
 have no idea where it all comes from; I am 
 often astounded myself to read it after I have 
 got it down on the paper." I remember a 
 great preacher telling me that he often felt just 
 in that way a"|30ut some of his sermons. When 
 he had preached them, or when he had prepared 
 them, he read them over again with curious 
 and devouring interest, and could not think 
 they were his own. He had been moved by 
 the Holy Ghost, and he watched with great 
 inquisitiveness the discoveries revealed to him. 
 Verse 21 " ^^^en spake from God J' And that word " from'' ! 
 It is in these prepositions that we so lack in 
 trying to carry out the vividness of the original. 
 It means right out of God, right out of the very 
 depths of the Deity ! " Men spake out of God!" 
 Their speech was born in God, God-driven, 
 God-controlled. That is so ever and every- 
 where, from the prophet of the earliest times 
 to the last prophet who speaks to the listening 
 ears of our own day. " The voice of the great 
 Eternal speaks in their mighty tone." " No 
 proj)hecy ever came by the will of man : but men 
 spake from God, being moved by the Holy Ghost." 
 
CHAPTER I. 19-21 271 
 
 So mucli for tlie prophet. Now I turn from 
 the prophet to the prophecy ; and what, accord- 
 iijg to my text, is the abiding characteristic of 
 all true prophecy ? Here is the guiding word : 
 It is "as a lamp shining in a squalid place, Verse 19 
 until the day daiun, and the day-star arise in 
 your hearts^ "As a lamp!" Then prophecy 
 is something luminous, and therefore something 
 illuminating. "A lamp shining in a squalid 
 place." True prophecy always exposes the 
 squalor of its time. "When the prophet speaks, 
 something shady stands revealed, something 
 iniquitous stands exposed. The prophet always 
 brings with him a light brighter than the 
 twilight of accepted compromise. He comes 
 with something of the light eternal ; he is a 
 lamp, and in the presence of the shining prophet 
 the sins of his time come into visibility, and 
 are named and declared. This is what we 
 should expect. If we turn to the book of the 
 psalmist we find these expressive words : " Our 
 secret sins in the light of Thy countenance." 
 We come into the light of the Lord's presence, 
 and our secret sins leap into view, just as motes 
 are seen in the sunbeam, and just as faded 
 patches and rents are exposed in the broad 
 light of the fuller day. And if a man comes 
 from God, bearing with him something of this 
 same eternal light, if he comes as a lamp, we 
 
272 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER, 
 
 must expect tliat the squalor and the deformity 
 of his day will become visible before him. 
 That is ever true, true of the far-off prophet 
 Elijah. If you want to see the sin and the 
 perversity and the squalor of that far-off day, 
 stand near the man who has got the lamp. It 
 is the same with the prophet Amos. If you 
 want to see the rottenness of the gilded cere- 
 monial religion of his day, and the injustices, 
 and the perverted relationships of man to man, 
 stand near the herdsman who has got the lamp. 
 It is true of John the Baptist. If you want 
 to see the sin of the times in which our Lord 
 was born, stand near the man who has got the 
 lamp. If you stand near Savonarola, you see 
 the iniquities of Florence. If you stand near 
 Thomas Carlyle, you behold the hollow shams 
 and conventions of our own day. If you stand 
 near General Booth, you will see the miseries 
 and the deformities and the crookednesses of 
 the submerged tenth. Until General Booth 
 appeared we had never really seen them. 
 *' Darkest England and the way out." " The 
 people who sat in darkness saw a great light." 
 That is ever characteristic of prophecy. It 
 reveals the squalor in the squalid place, it 
 unveils it for the purpose of removing it. It 
 reveals the darkness and corruption of the city 
 by bringing into view a vision of the New 
 
CHAPTER I. 19-21 273 
 
 Jerusalem, the city come down out of heaven 
 from God. The first characteristic of true 
 prophecy is that it is luminous and illuminating, 
 exposing where exposure is needed. Mark the 
 progress and sequence of my text. "A lamp 
 shining in a squalid place, until the day daivn ! " Verse 15 
 Prophecy is not only luminous, it is progressive. 
 Do you mark the increasing expansion of the 
 terms ? I think it is very beautiful and sug- 
 gestive to notice it: "A lamp," "a day-star!" 
 The dawning! and on to perfect noon! The 
 prophet of to-day speaks a larger word than 
 the prophet of the earliest time. Savonarola 
 was a child of the dawning ; Amos was a child 
 of the lamp. It is always necessary to remem- 
 ber this. "When I remember this, it clears away 
 a thousand difficulties from the sacred page. 
 When I go back to Elijah, or to Amos, or to 
 Micah, I must not expect the large and com- 
 prehensive light of the dawn. I must expect 
 lamplight, partial light, local light ; but a lamp 
 always shining above the current standard of 
 the time. When you go back to Elijah you go 
 from dawn to lamps, and the principle must 
 guide you in your apprehension and apprecia- 
 tion of the prophet's teaching. I do not know 
 that the electric light need speak altogether 
 in such contemptuous terms of the horn lamp, 
 and I do not know why the horn lamp should 
 
274 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 so fiercely and vehemently disparage the rush. 
 The crucial criterion is this: Not whether 
 Elijah equals Paul, and not whether Amos 
 equals Thomas Carlyle. The crucial criterion 
 is this: When Elijah held his lamp, what 
 about the squalor ? Was he above the current 
 standard? Did he shine above the accepted 
 compromise ? Did he bring in the radiance of 
 the ideal ? When I go back to Amos I do not 
 expect to see dawnlight, but lamplight. I find 
 in Hosea, in Amos, many things I do not like ; 
 but I am a child of a richer privilege, a child 
 of a larger day. The question is this: Had 
 they a lamp which exposed the dirt? Did 
 they bring out the squalor, and did they make 
 revelations of which even we, in our own day, 
 do well to tuke heed? The light has been 
 progressive: a lamp for Elijah, a day-star for 
 another man, the broader light of the dawning 
 for another. And still the light of prophecy is 
 progressive. We, too, are only yet in the early 
 dawning ; we are far away yet from the perfect 
 noon. The prophet of to-day and to-morrow 
 has still richer and deeper things to tell us from 
 God. He need not be a repetition of yester- 
 day, he need not be a repeater of old saws 
 and counsels, carrying precisely the same lamp. 
 Still, to-day as ever, our prophet speaks from 
 God, and in the utterance of these more 
 
CHAPTER I. 19-21 275 
 
 privileged times we ought to behold a bright- 
 ness far more radiant than the current standard, 
 far more exacting in its demands— an inspira- 
 tion leading us nearer to that glorious consum- 
 mation when we shall know even as we are 
 known. 
 
 And lastly, how shall we receive a prophet 
 and understand his message when he comes ? 
 Here is the guiding word : ^^ No prophecy of verse 2C 
 Scripture is of private interpretation^^ We are 
 not at liberty to take our own roads to the 
 interpretation. Private ways of that sort will 
 never lead to the truth. There is a prescribed 
 highway by which the deep secrets of prophets 
 can be gained. A just interpretation of pro- 
 phecy will always depend upon the spirit in 
 which we approach it. Thomas a Kempis 
 has a very revealing word in, I believe, the 
 very first chapter of that wonderfully helpful 
 book The Imitation of Christ. " By what spirit * 
 
 any scripture was made, by that same spirit 
 must it be interpreted." If you want to inter- 
 pret a prophecy aright you must get into the 
 spirit in which it was born. You cannot take 
 a private way. Only in that way, the way in 
 which it had its birth, can you get its secret 
 meaning. I think that is true of literature in 
 general. I was reading only the other day 
 a book by one of the ablest literary critics 
 
276 THE SECOND EPISTLE OP PETER 
 
 of the last fifty years, and he said he never 
 understood the drive, and spring, and leap of 
 Sir "Walter Scott's Marmion until he declaimed 
 it aloud on a galloping horse. But why did 
 the secret of Marraion come out when it was 
 declaimed on the back of a galloping horse ? 
 Because it was composed on the back of a gallop- 
 ing horse. And if you will turn to Marmion with 
 this conception of the leap, and spring, and gallop 
 in your mind and heart, you will get the very 
 go and drive and rhythm of the poem. That 
 will suffice for our purpose. We are to re- 
 arrange the conditions under which poetry was 
 born if we are to discern and interpret its 
 meaning. And so it is with all prophecy and 
 all poetry, and all music. What is the use 
 of bringing a commercial instinct to the inter- 
 pretation of Wordsworth ? What could you 
 do with it ? If you want to understand 
 Wordsworth, you must become identified with 
 the man, you must become possessed by the 
 Wordsworthian mood. How, then, shall I find 
 the secret of Isaiah, of Paul, of Savonarola, or 
 of Luther ? Not by any private interpretation, 
 but by that same spirit in which their message 
 and prophecy were born. Is not this the word 
 of the Master ? " He that receiveth a prophet 
 in the spirit of a prophet shall receive a pro- 
 phet's reward.^^ He that receiveth Wordsworth 
 
CHAPTER I. 19-21 277 
 
 in the spirit of "Wordsworth, will enter into 
 Wordsworth's work. He that receiveth Paul 
 in the spirit of Paul will walk in the highways 
 and byways of Paul's inheritance. It is no use 
 my going to Paul or to Isaiah with mere imple- 
 ments of criticism, however delicate or however 
 refined they may be I shall fail to discover 
 the secrets of his intimacy; I shall be locked 
 out from his innermost fellowship. We must 
 come to these men with reverence, with 
 humility, with sincerity of purpose, with that 
 absolute frankness which offers a sensitive sur- 
 face to all good things. To sum it all up, the 
 Holy Spirit must interpret what the Holy Spirit 
 first inspired, and it would be far better to 
 have no critical apparatus at all, and to know 
 nothing about scholarship and nothing about 
 learning, and to come to the sacred page with 
 the shoes from off the feet, than to go burdened 
 with all manner of learning and scholarship, 
 and tramp loudly and flippantly in the most 
 sacred place. You cannot get into secrets by 
 private and heedless ways of that kind. It 
 will have to be done in the broad highway of 
 God's Holy Spirit. We need the Holy Spirit. 
 And what we need we can get. And if ye, 
 then, beiiog evil, know how to give good gifts 
 unto your children, how much more shall your 
 Father give the holy, interpreting Spirit to 
 
278 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 them that ask it ? And so you see we can all 
 be interpreters, and, blessed be God, we can 
 all be prophets too ! For if we are all filled 
 with the Holy Spirit there will come into our 
 message the prophetic significance, into our 
 very singing the prophetic fervour, into our 
 ordinary intercourse and converse spiritual 
 energy and pith. The Holy Spirit will speak 
 through me. 
 
 Oh, teach me, Lord, that I may teach 
 
 The precious things Thou dost impart ; 
 And wing my words that they may reach 
 
 The hidden depths of many a heart. 
 Oh, fill me with Thy fulness, Lord, 
 
 Until my very heart o'erfiow 
 With kindling thought and glowing word 
 
 Thy love to tell, Thy praise to show. 
 
DESTEUCTIVE HERESIES 
 
 2 Peter ii. 1 
 
 But there arose false prophets also among the people^ as 
 among you also there shall he false teachers^ who shall 
 privily bring in destructive heresies, denying even the Master 
 that bought them^ bringing upon themselves swift destruction. 
 
 This is a dark and appalling chapter. There is 
 nothing quite like it elsewhere in the entire 
 book. The misery and desolation of it are 
 unrelieved. It is so like some wide and 
 soddened moor, in a night of cold and drizzling 
 rain, made lurid now and again by lightning- 
 flash and weird with the growl of rolling 
 thunder. Everywhere is the black and 
 treacherous bog. The moral pollution is over- 
 whelming. I confess that I have stood before 
 it for months, in the hope of seeing my way 
 across, and even now I am by no means con- 
 fident of a sure-footed exposition. The gutter 
 conditions are ubiquitous. The descriptive 
 language is intense, violent, terrific. There is 
 no softening of the shade from end to end. It 
 begins in the denunciation of " lascivious 
 
 279 
 
280 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 doings " ; it continues through " pits of dark- 
 ness," "lawless deeds," "lust of defilement," 
 " spots and blemishes," " children of cursing " ; 
 and it ends in the gruesome figure of " the dog 
 turning to his own vomit and the sow that had 
 washed to wallowing in the mire." It is an 
 awful chapter, borrowing its symbolism from 
 *' springs without water," and from " mists 
 driven by a storm," and recalling the ashes of 
 " Sodom and Gomorrah " to enforce the urgency 
 and terror of its judgment. 
 
 Is there any road across this dark and 
 swampy moor? Has the bog a secret? To 
 drop my figure, has this wide-spreading pollu- 
 tion an explanation ? Amid all the cold mystery 
 and darkness of the chapter, one thing becomes 
 increasingly clear as we gaze upon it, that the 
 depraved life is the creation of perverse 
 thought, that in " destructive heresies " is to be 
 found the explanation of this immoral conduct. 
 I say this is one of the clear and primary 
 emphases of the apostle's teaching. A man's 
 thought determines the moral climate of his life, 
 and will settle the question whether his conduct 
 is to be poisonous marsh or fertile meadow, 
 fragrant garden or barren sand. The pose of 
 the mind determines the dispositions, and will 
 settle whether a man shall soar with angels in 
 the heavenlies or wallow with the sow in the 
 
CHAPTER II. 1 281 
 
 mire. "What we think about the things that 
 are greatest will determine how we do the 
 things that are least. "What are your primary 
 thoughts about God? The prints of those 
 thoughts will be found in your courtesies, in 
 your intercourse, in the common relationships 
 of life, in the government of commerce, in the 
 control of the body, and in all the affairs of 
 home and market and field. All the corruption 
 of this chapter is traced up to unworthy con- 
 ceptions of Christ, to the partial, if not entire, 
 dethronement of " the Lord of life and glory." 
 The immorality has its explanation in "de- 
 structive heresy." 
 
 " What think ye of Christ ? " In what was 
 their thought defective ? What was the essence 
 of the heresy ? The secret is here, they had no 
 adequate sense of His holiness. All true and 
 efficient thinking about God begins in the con- 
 ception of His holiness. If you begin with His 
 love, you deoxj^genate the very affection you 
 proclaim. If you begin with His mercy, you 
 deprive it of the very salt which makes it a 
 m*inister of healing and defence. If you begin 
 with His condescension, it is a condescension 
 emasculated, because you have not gazed upon 
 His loft}^ and sublime abode. You cannot get a 
 glimpse of the unspeakable humility of Calvary 
 until your eyes are filled with the glory of the 
 
282 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 great white throne. If you would know the 
 depth you must begin with the height! Our 
 thinking concerning the Lord must not take its 
 rise in His compassions or His love. We must 
 begin with the pure white ray. We must begin 
 with the great white throne ! When the man 
 Isaiah was refashioned for the prophetic life, 
 it was not some softened glimpse of a wistful 
 family circle in glory which absorbed his gaze. 
 It was the vision of a throne, " high and lifted 
 up." And those who stood about the throne 
 were not moving in light and familiar liberty. 
 *' Each one had six wings ; with twain he covered 
 his face, and with twain he covered his feet." 
 How solemn, and how reverent, and how wor- 
 shipful ! And the voices which he heard were 
 not the jaunty songs and liltings which are 
 sung at the fireside. "And one cried unto 
 another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord 
 of hosts." It was in circumstances like these, 
 and upon heights like these, that the prophet's 
 thinking began ! Do not think that grave and 
 venerable experiences of this kind make life 
 severe and hard and rob it of its juice and 
 freedom. There is no man who has more to 
 say about the throne and the awful splendours 
 that gather about it, no man who tells us more 
 about the thunders and lightnings that proceed 
 out of it, than just the apostle who has given 
 
CHAPTER II. 1 283 
 
 us the most exquisitely tender letter in the New 
 Testament Scriptures. John Calvin is a name 
 that has become almost synonymous with hard- 
 ness, unbendableness, severity, with high and 
 austere contemplation, but you do the man a 
 grave injustice and you miss the interpretative 
 secret of his life if you ignore or overlook the 
 wells of most delicate compassion in which his 
 life and writings abound. Our softest water is 
 the water that flows over granitic beds. If you 
 would know what it made of Isaiah, read through 
 his message and examine his life. The rivers of 
 tenderness and compassion which flow in this 
 book are not anywhere to be surpassed except by 
 " the river of water of life " which " flows from 
 the throne of God and of the Lamb." When 
 you have read the sixth chapter of Isaiah, when 
 you have tremblingly gazed upon the throne, 
 *' high and lifted up," when you have looked 
 upon the veiled and stooping seraphim, and 
 when you have listened to the solemn sound 
 of holy voices " chanting by the crystal sea," 
 then turn to the fortieth chapter, and hear the 
 sound of running waters, the rivers of com- 
 passion—" Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, 
 saith the Lord. Speak ye comfortably to 
 Jerusalem, and cry unto her that her warfare 
 is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned. 
 , . , He shall feed His flock like a shepherd ! " 
 
284 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 The soft compassion of the fortieth chapter 
 finds its explanation in the solemn severities 
 of the sixth. I stood by a Swiss chalet, on the 
 lower slopes of a lovely vale, and by the house 
 there flowed a gladsome river, full and forceful, 
 laughing and dancing in its liberty, and in- 
 stinctively I prayed that my life might be as 
 the river, full of power and full of song, clearing 
 obstacles with a nimble leap, and hastening on 
 to the great and eternal sea. And to my voice- 
 less prayer there came reply, " Follow up the 
 stream to its birth ! " And I tracked the buoyant 
 river, and I reached the snow-line, and I found 
 that in the spreading wastes of virgin-snow the 
 singing minister had its birth. And then I knew 
 that full and forceful Christian lives must have 
 their source in sovereign holiness, that only 
 above the snow-line, near the great white 
 throne, could they find an adequate birth. 
 *'Hast thou forsaken the snows of Lebanon?'* 
 That is the " destructive heresy," to begin one's 
 thinking and one's doing otherwhere than in 
 the holiness of God. To begin elsewhere is to 
 be sure of impoverishment, and to have a life- 
 river which will lose itself in unwholesome 
 swamp and bog, and become the parent of moral 
 corruption and contagion. "Holy, holy, holy, 
 is the Lord of hosts." 
 
 But let me still further analyse this " de- 
 
CHAPTER II. 1 285 
 
 structive heresy." If we do not begin with the 
 Lord's holiness, we can have no discernment of 
 the Lord's atonement. Dwell below the snow- 
 line, and you want no atonement ! And for 
 this reason. The man who does not begin his 
 thinking in divine holiness will have no keen 
 and poignant perception of human sin. AVhat 
 you see in a thing depends very much upon 
 its background. John Euskin has shown us 
 how the whitest notepaper, exposed before 
 the tribunal of bright sunshine, reveals its in- 
 herent grey. It all depends upon the back- 
 ground. If your background be gas-light, your 
 notepaper will appear superlatively white ; but 
 if the background be the all-revealing flame of 
 God's resplendent sun, the apparent white will 
 darken into grey. I have seen a sea-gull in 
 flight, with a black cloud for a background, and 
 the bird seemed white as driven snow ; I have 
 seen the same bird upon the water, with a back- 
 ground of snowy foam, and the wings were 
 grey. Yes, what is your background ? If you 
 do not begin with the holiness of God you will 
 never see the blackness of sin. If 3^our back- 
 ground be some indifferent human standard, 
 some halting expediency, some easy policy, 
 human life, and your own included, will appear 
 passably clear. I think I am no pessimist, but 
 I confess I look with some alarm at what I 
 
286 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 cannot but regard as the lessening sense pf 
 sin whicli seems to hold our modern thought 
 and life. One's fears are difficult to express 
 because the dark symptoms themselves are so 
 difficult to disengage and define. But I feel 
 a certain dulness, a certain drowsiness, in the 
 spiritual life. I feel a certain close, enerva- 
 ting mugginess in the moral atmosphere ; a want 
 of alertness, of sharp and sensitive response. 
 Our modern Churches are too indolently con- 
 tented, too prematurely satisfied, and are much 
 too willing to take easy advantage of the com- 
 promises ofibred of the world. We must become 
 suspicious of an indulgent terminology. A 
 violent antagonist of the Christian faith, a man 
 whose method of attack is of the slap-dash 
 kind, declared, only a few days ago, " There is 
 no such thing as sin ; there is only error." The 
 man who begins with that diagnosis can never 
 prescribe for me. But we must see to it that 
 we do not take advantage of this indulgent 
 term, and the Christian pulpit must proclaim 
 the holiness of the Lord, and allow no web of 
 wordy sophistry to hide the great white throne ! 
 We have frequently been told that we need to 
 recover the word " grace " ; we need first to re- 
 cover the word " holiness " ; holiness will recover 
 the word sin. And if sin does not appear sin, 
 but passes muster as imperfect virtue, wherein 
 
CHAPTER II. 1 287 
 
 comes the need of atonement ? No holiness, no 
 sin ; no sin, no Saviour ! E-edemption is a super- 
 fluity, and the ministry of Jesus is a wasteful 
 toil, and His passion is a fruitless death. The 
 man who has no vision of holiness has no per- 
 ception of the Atonement, and he " denies the 
 Lord that bought him." It is the man who has 
 ascended above the snow-line, who will wail in 
 his secret soul, " Woe is me, for I am unclean," 
 and who will smite upon his breast, saying, 
 " God be merciful to me a sinner ! " 
 
 "Well, now, see the consequence of these 
 things. I have been trying to expound the 
 " destructive heresy " which I think is the 
 initial cause of the pollution which is so terribly 
 unfolded in this chapter. If these cardinal 
 conceptions are dull or eclipsed, other precious 
 things will be destroyed. Cast your eyes over 
 this widespread corruption. There are some 
 " conspicuous absences." There are many 
 missing treasures, whose absence accounts for 
 the filth. I miss the instinct of reverence! 
 They tremble not "to rail at dignities." It is 
 an ill thing in a life when a man has no 
 sovereignty before which he bows in reverent 
 awe. Take out the august, and life is reduced 
 to flippancy, and levity is the master of the 
 feast both day and night. A man who never 
 reveres will find it impossible to be true. The 
 
288 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 man who never kneels in spirit can scarcely be 
 upright in life. To bow to nothing is to be 
 master of nothing. If we have no sense of 
 the august to worship, we shall have httle sense 
 of sin to expel. 
 
 I know that in using this word "august" I 
 am using and borrowing a characteristic ex- 
 pression of my great predecessor Dr. Dale, 
 and I hope I am using it with something of 
 his own reach and loftiness of thought. 
 I do not know anything which is more 
 needed in our Free Church life and worship 
 than an awed and reverent consciousness 
 of God. I could wish that we moved about 
 our very sanctuaries with a softer step, and 
 that our very demeanour was that of men who 
 are held in a subdued wonder at the majestic 
 presence of God. I sometimes think that our 
 very detachment from any prescribed order of 
 service, our boundless freedom, our familiarity 
 with the Lord, our easy intimacy in communion, 
 need to be guarded from besetting perils. Even 
 when we rejoice in the Gospel of Calvary let 
 us " give thanks at the remembrance of 
 His holiness." 
 
 Before Jehovah's awful throne 
 Ye nations bow with sacred joy. 
 
 I do not think we are in danger of " railing 
 at dignities," but I do think we are in danger of 
 
CHAPTER II. 1 289 
 
 forgetting the supreme dignity of them. In 
 one of his letters to Matthew Mowat, Samuel 
 Rutherford uses these words : " Ye should give 
 [God] all His own court-styles, His high and 
 heaven-names." I think we are a little lacking 
 in the court-style, in this use of the high and 
 heaven-names. But the use of the high names 
 will come back when our souls are humbly 
 gazing upon the high things. AVhen we shall 
 see Him as John the Evangelist saw Him, we, 
 too, " shall fall at His feet as one dead." Our 
 souls will always have the stoop of reverent 
 adoration while we keep in view the vision 
 of the holiness of our Lord. In all this 
 revelling, sweltering chapter I miss the sense 
 of sin. 
 
 And amid all the movements I miss another 
 treasure, the sense of a large and noble free- 
 dom. I know there is a talk of freedom, but 
 freedom is not enjoyed. " Promising them 
 liberty," and the poor fools are deluded into 
 the thought that they are in possession of 
 it. I know they are '' doing just as they 
 like," but of all foriAs of bondage that is the 
 worst; for this great world, and the laws 
 of its government, are not built upon the 
 " likes " of men, but upon the rights and 
 prerogatives of God. How can a man be free, 
 even though the song of freedom be ever on 
 
 19 
 
290 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 his lips, if all the powers in grace and nature 
 are pledged to overthrow him ? I tell you 
 every flower of the field is ranked against 
 defilement, and all the forces of this wonderful 
 planet are arrayed against the man whose 
 only arbiter is his own " likes," instead of 
 being determined by the arbitrament of the 
 will and purpose of God. A man who is in 
 sin, and assumes he is in liberty, and is satisfied 
 with his position, has not risen to the con- 
 tentment and liberty which are the glory of 
 humankind, but is sunk to the animal bondage 
 of the sow, which gloats and wallows in the 
 mire. 
 
 There are other missing treasures which I 
 might name, but I will content myself in 
 mentioning only one — the absence of any 
 perception of the drift and purpose of history. 
 "When the great things go out of life, when 
 the sublime is exiled, when reverence dies and 
 the days decline in triviality, men lose their 
 sense of history, and yesterday has no voice. 
 " And I heard a voice behind me, saying ! " 
 That is the voice of yesterday, and it is the 
 privilege of those who are in the fellowship of 
 God to know its interpretation. Sodom and 
 Gomorrah shout through the centuries, and so 
 do Nineveh and Babylon, and Greece and 
 Eome ! " If God spared not the ancient world, 
 
CHAPTER II. 1 291 
 
 but preserved Noali with seven others, a preacher 
 of righteousness, when He brought a flood 
 upon the ungodly " ; and if God turned " the 
 cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes. . . ." 
 — that is the voice of history, the shoutings of 
 experience, and by the people in this chapter 
 the voice is unheeded because unheard. All 
 these " conspicuous absences " — the instinct of 
 reverence, the feeling of sin, the sense of a 
 noble freedom, and the recognition of historical 
 witness — are accounted for by perverse thinking, 
 by " destructive heresies," by the degradation 
 of the Godhead, by the eclipse of the great ^ 
 white throne. Having no sense of holiness, 
 they " denied the Lord that bought them." 
 The lack of lofty summit explains the corrupt 
 and stagnant plain. 
 
 Now this particular species of heresy may 
 not be prevalent to-day. I do not know that 
 we could find its precise lineaments in our own 
 time. But we may give the teaching wide 
 dominion. Our primary conception of the 
 Lord will determine the trend and quality of 
 our own life, and the depth or shallowness 
 of its ministry. "Whatever dethrones or dis-^ 
 parages Christ will impair and impoverish man.y 
 Anything that cheapens the Saviour will make 
 us worthless. Any teaching which puts Him 
 out of account, which removes Him from the 
 
292 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 front place, which relegates Him to the rear, 
 which in any way '' denies " Him, is a " de- 
 structive heresy," and is fraught with peril and 
 destruction. Is there any modern peril ? 
 
 There is a prevalent teaching to-day which 
 is usually known as the '' New Thought." I do 
 not speak as its antagonist, but as one who 
 wishes to preserve it from becoming a minister 
 of weakness and destruction. I welcome much 
 of its teaching. I believe that in discover- 
 ing and clarifying psychological laws it may 
 render unspeakable help to the living of a 
 Christian life. I believe that we are now 
 standing upon the borderland of a marvellous 
 country, and that mystic forces are to be 
 revealed to us of which hitherto we have only 
 dimly dreamed. I believe that the marvellous 
 phenomena of telepathy and hypnotism, and all 
 the discoveries we are making in this dim and 
 impalpable world, may mightily help us in the 
 fortification of pure and resolute habit. But I 
 see a danger, an ominous danger, a danger real 
 and immediate. I know the literature of this 
 new teaching, the literature both of this country 
 and of the United States; I speak from first- 
 hand knowledge, and I say that the teaching 
 gives no adequate place and sovereignty to 
 Jesus Christ our Lord. He is of little or no 
 account ; He is occasionally mentioned, but only 
 
CHAPTEE II. 1 293 
 
 as one of a crowd, and He is not accorded that 
 unique and solitary pre-eminence which He 
 claims. In one of the latest, and in some 
 respects the ablest, of these books I have looked 
 in vain from end to end for even the bare 
 mention of the Saviour's name. He does not 
 count ! He is a negligible and therefore 
 neglected factor, and is left entirely out of the 
 reckoning. And because He is absent, other 
 things are missing. I find no mention of 
 guilt. Earely do I stumble upon the fact of 
 sin. In the ''New Thought" there is no con- 
 fession of sin, no sob of penitence, no plea for 
 forgiveness, no leaning upon mercy. The atone- 
 ment is an obsolete device, the pardonable 
 expedient of a primitive day. ''A man must 
 acquire the art," says one of the best of these 
 teachers, "the art of allowing the past, with 
 whatever errors, sins, faults, follies, or ignorances 
 entangled, to slip out of sight." How easy the 
 suggestion, how tremendous the achievement! 
 For the most of us that burden slips away only 
 where the pilgrim's burden rolled awa}^, at 
 the foot of the Saviour's cross, where it rolls 
 into the Saviour's grave. I care not what 
 veins of helpful ministry these men and women 
 may strike, if they ignore the Saviour and 
 the ministry of redeeming grace, they are 
 dealing with essentially surface forces as com- 
 
294 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 pared with the mighty powers born of personal 
 communion with Him. It is a teaching which 
 practically " denies the Lord that bought us," 
 and so far it is a " destructive heresy " which 
 offers no adequate ministry for the liberation 
 of sinful men, and for the attainment of a full 
 and matured life. All thinking is initially 
 wrong which does not begin with the unique 
 holiness of the Lord, and which does not reserve 
 for Him a supreme and sovereign place in man's 
 redemption. And that, too, is the severest 
 indictment of spiritualism. It has little or 
 nothing to do with the Lord. It concerns itself 
 with meaner folk, with smaller themes, and with 
 trivial communion. Who ever heard of a 
 spiritualistic campaign for the reclamation of 
 the lost? That's where its sense is dull. 
 ''Saviour!" That's where the vision is dim. 
 We must bring all teachings, and all ministries 
 to the touchstone of our exalted Lord and 
 Saviour. What do they do with Him ? What 
 think they of Christ? We must suspect any- 
 thing and everything which lays Him under 
 eclipse. Do they deny the Lord that bought 
 US ? Do they dim His glory, and rank Him in 
 the indiscriminate crowd ? Then we must label 
 them as " destructive heresies," whose forces 
 can never achieve the redemption of human- 
 kind. 
 
CHAPTER n. 1 295 
 
 "What, then, shall we pray for ourselves and 
 for others ? First of all we will pray that we 
 may never lose sight of the heights of the 
 Divine holiness ! We are told that they, who 
 dwell beneath great domes, acquire a certain 
 loftiness and stateliness of bearing which dis- 
 tinguishes them from their fellows. Let us 
 pray that about our brethren and ourselves 
 there may be a mystic significance, a breadth 
 and height of character, a nobility of life, 
 telling of the sublime abode in which we dwell. 
 May we dwell in the truth, live and move in 
 the truth, and by no perilous emphasis of minor 
 themes and things deny the Lord that bought us. 
 
WOESE THAN THE FIEST 
 
 1 Peter ii. 20, 21 
 
 For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the, 
 world through the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ, they are again entangled therein and overcome, the 
 last state is become worse tvith them than the first. For it 
 were better for them not to have known the way of righteous- 
 ness, than, after knowing it, to turn back from the holy 
 commandment delivered unto the7n. 
 
 Verse 20 " The last state is become worse with them than 
 the firstJ^ Apostasy is worse than ignorance ! 
 It were better for us never to have come within 
 sight of the Kingdom, and to have remained 
 in ignorance of its privileges and glory, than, 
 having entered the gate, to become rebels to 
 its sovereignty, and to turn our backs upon its 
 contemplated ministries of grace. To approach 
 the Divine is an unspeakable favour; it is also 
 an appalling responsibility. Light that is trifled 
 with becomes lightning ; the splendour of the 
 great white throne becomes a " consuming fire." 
 To have known, and then to rebel, translates 
 our very knowledge into a minister of destruc- 
 tion. The abuse of the highest degrades us 
 
 296 
 
CHAPTER II. 20, 21 297 
 
 beneath the lowest. " The first shall be last." 
 " The last is become worse with them than the 
 first." " Lilies that fester smell far worse than 
 weeds." Here, in the apostle's words, we have 
 depicted for us the rise and fall of a soul. 
 There is the realisation of moral deliverance : 
 " they have escaped the defilements of the world Verse 20 
 through the knoivledge of our Lord and Saviour 
 Jesus Ghristr There is the subsequent moral 
 relapse : " they are again entangled therein and 
 overcome.^^ And there is the consequent de- 
 terioration in the moral and spiritual capital 
 of the life : ^^the last state is become worse with 
 them than the first.^^ 
 
 The realisation of moral deliverance. " They 
 have escaped the defilements of the world." 
 What is this " defilement " of the world in 
 which these souls have been imprisoned ? Who 
 can define it ? Who can lay hold of this subtle 
 and varying corruption, and give it an inter- 
 pretative name ? Its metamorphoses are extra- 
 ordinary. It has a hundred different guises, 
 changing its attire continually, but amid aU its 
 shifting appearances it remains essentially the 
 same. You have the same essential elements 
 in solid ice, in flowing water, in hissing steam, 
 in wreathing vapour, in moving cloud. In all 
 the multiplex forms you have the same essence : 
 the reality abides j it is only a change of attire. 
 
298 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEB 
 
 You can have tlie same poison in varying pre- 
 parations, mingling with different compounds, 
 appearing in diverse colours, and confined within 
 dissimilar flasks. The incidentals are many, the 
 poisonous essence is one and the same. And 
 so it is with this "corruption" of the world; 
 it pervades different sets of circumstances ; it 
 enshrines itself in different compositions, but 
 everywhere and anywhere it is the same de- 
 structive minister. It is the same in White- 
 chapel and Belgravia, in the House of Commons 
 and on a racecourse, in the King's palace and 
 the peasant's hut, in the Church and on the 
 Exchange. You may have " the defilements of 
 the world" palpable and gross, and you may 
 have them tenuous and refined. They may be 
 rank and offensive as "the lust of the flesh"; 
 they may be rare and vain and elusive as " the 
 pride of life." Yes, many forms, but one spirit ! 
 ** The fashion of this world passeth away." The 
 " fashion " changes ; the thing itself abides. 
 
 " The defilements of the world." Every age 
 seems to have its own characteristic corruption, 
 its own destructive, worldly form and colour. 
 When St. Anthony went out into the Egyptian 
 desert as a protest and safeguard against the 
 corruption of his time, it was a different form 
 of worldliness to that which encountered St. 
 Benedict in a succeeding century, and which 
 
CHAPTEE II. 20, 21 299 
 
 drove him to found his great Monastic Order ; 
 and the worldliness against which St. Benedict 
 contended differed from the corruption which 
 surrounded St. Francis when, at a later day, he 
 established the Order of the Mendicant Friars. 
 All these forms of monasticism fought the same 
 essential corruption, but it appeared here in 
 the shape of a decaying individualism, and there 
 in the shape of social and political dissolution, 
 and yonder in the shape of a proud and luxurious 
 Church. ''The fashion of this world passeth y 
 away." How different is the worldliness which 
 forced the Salvation Army into existence from 
 the worldliness which prevailed at the time of 
 the evangelical revival! John Wesley and 
 General Booth looked out upon quite different 
 conditions, but the difference was only in the 
 shape of the flask and the colour of the com- 
 pound; the essential adversary was the same. 
 The corruption of our own day wears a different 
 guise from the corruption of twenty-five years 
 ago. It has transferred itself to other spheres, 
 and has pervaded new sets of relationships, and 
 you have to look for it in new attire. The 
 fashion changes ; the pollution abides ! Behind 
 all the shiftings of the centuries the defilement 
 persists, and it manifests itself in a mode of 
 thinking, a mode of working, and a mode of 
 living which is essentially anti-Christian. It 
 
300 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 is the anti-Christian drift in the life of a 
 generation which constitutes its pollution, and 
 such drift may be found with equal certainty 
 in Mayfair and the Seven Dials. It is a subtle 
 spirit, now enshrining itself in an individual, 
 now in a society, now in a Parliament, now 
 in literature, now in art, now in the acquisi- 
 tion of treasure, now in the apportioning of 
 leisure, in a hundred different vestures, but 
 remaining always the anti-Christian drift, and 
 ever degrading its victims into Christian 
 negations. 
 
 Now this " defilement of the world " is an 
 infection, and propagates itself like a foul 
 contagion. It is a significant and suggestive 
 thing that the word which our version translates 
 by " defilements " is our English word " miasma." 
 It is the suggestion of the process by which 
 the corruption works. " The miasma of the 
 world ! " And what is a miasma ? Medical 
 science has a synonym for the word which gives 
 us much enlightenment. ''Aerial poison ! " A 
 miasma is an aerial poison, an emanation or 
 effiuvia rising from the ground and floating in 
 the air. " The miasma of the world." It is 
 pervasive as an aerial poison, it distributes itself 
 like a destructive contagion. Let an unclean 
 miasma, some foul immorality, infest one lad in 
 a public school, and the school will seek its 
 
CHAPTER II. 20, 21 301 
 
 own security by his immediate expulsion. One 
 polluted lad can infect a thousand. " The 
 miasma of the world." We know the workings 
 of the principle in social clubs. It is amazing 
 how soon the miasma can pollute a society. It 
 has happened before now that one man has 
 degraded a social fellowship, and has created a 
 malaria which pure men have refused to breathe. 
 What has happened in smaller communities has 
 also prevailed in civic fellowships and in the 
 larger life of the State. " Evil communications 
 corrupt good manners." Sometimes we can 
 withdraw ourselves from an evil contagion, and 
 our withdrawal may tend to destroy it by 
 neglect. But we cannot altogether get away 
 from "the miasma of the world." We are in 
 the world, and the air is infected, and we have 
 got to breathe it. How then ? 
 
 There is a way of escape. " They have 
 escaped the miasma of the world." We can be 
 rendered immune, as medical science can make 
 us immune in the presence of some particular 
 contagion. " I pray not that Thou shouldest 
 take them out of the world," but that Thou 
 shouldest make them immune — " that Thou 
 shouldest keep them from the evil." Eegard 
 it or disregard it as we may, this is the claim 
 of the real Christian science, the promise of the 
 Gospel of Christ : "If they drink any deadly 
 
302 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 thing it shall not hurt them." It is possible for 
 a man to move amid the prevailing miasma of 
 his day, to live and move and have his being in 
 its very presence, and yet to remain in robust 
 moral health. Now, mark you, this moral 
 deliverance is attained through a spiritual 
 fellowship. " They have escaped the defilements 
 Verse 20 of the world through the knowledge of our Lord 
 and Saviour Jesus Christ'' An escape from the 
 miasma by the " knowledge " of a Person ! But 
 that word " knowledge " implies infinitely more 
 than mental conception. It is the " knowledge " 
 ^ which implies acquaintance, intimacy, com- 
 munion, community. I should not be doing 
 violence to the meaning of my text if I were 
 to read it in this wise : " They have escaped 
 the miasma of the world through the partnership 
 of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." It is a 
 *' knowledge " which implies a league, a covenant, 
 a ''partaking of the Divine nature"; and 
 through this marvellous union there flows into 
 human-kind a river of regenerating energy, 
 reinforcing our miserable weakness, and endow- 
 ing us with all the resistances of invincible 
 ^ health. Our Lord makes us immune to the 
 miasma of the world by communicating to us 
 His own victorious virtue, and by making us 
 sublimely positive to all the assaults and nega- 
 tions of the devil. "He restoreth my soul." 
 
CHAPTER II. 20, 21 303 
 
 *' Thou shalt not be afraid of the pestilence that 
 walketh in darkness." *'I will fear no ill.' * 
 Such is the way of escape. 
 
 But now the apostle unfolds a dark sequence. 
 The moral deliverance may be followed by a 
 moral relapse. " They are again enta.ngled Verse 2( 
 therein and overcome." Need I say that this 
 immoral alliance is occasioned by the breaking 
 of the spiritual alliance ? Our spiritual attach- 
 ment endows us with a powerful antidote and 
 antagonism to the miasma of the world. Relax 
 the attachment and you weaken the antidote. 
 Sever your spiritual communion and you im- 
 poverish your moral defence. It is a sequence 
 which is illustrated every day in multitudes of 
 lives. Maintain your alliance with the Lord, 
 and you are secure in a health which keeps 
 your enemy at the gate. Let your alliance 
 become loose, and your moral repulsion grows 
 faint. I offer no argument to prove it ; the 
 proof is found in common experience. " Demas 
 hath forsaken me, having loved this present 
 evil world." Yes, but before Demas had for- 
 saken Paul, he had broken with the Lord, and 
 then he swung back in mighty drift towards r 
 the world. When he had wilfully rejected the 
 help of the heavenly energy, he succumbed to 
 the gravitation of the world. He was no longer 
 immune, and the miasma subdued him in the 
 
304 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 common defilement. How suggestive are the 
 words in which the apostle describes the re- 
 Verse 20 lapse : " They are again entangled^ They begin 
 to move towards the world, and presently they 
 become involved. It is a figure of this kind : 
 they go too near the destructive machinery ; 
 they go in a prying curiosity, and they are 
 caught by a sleeve, and are undone ! " They 
 are again entangled." Ah, it is by our loose- 
 nesses that we are caught and involved ! "When 
 we leave our Lord our thought becomes loose, 
 we exercise too much freedom of thinking ; and 
 some loose end becomes entangled, and we are 
 " overcome." When we leave our Lord our 
 speech becomes loose ; we say what we like and 
 not what we ought; and some loose phrase 
 gets entangled and we are " overcome." When 
 we leave our Lord our affections become loose ; 
 deserting the great Lover we flirt with the 
 world : " I will go after my lovers." We become 
 "lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God," 
 and we are speedily involved and undone. Im- 
 mediately we begin to weaken our alliance 
 with the Lord we begin to re-establish our 
 communion with the world. The re-establish- 
 ment of the immoral alliance may begin in 
 apparently trifling flirtations, but it speedily 
 issues in a dark enslavement. When you wish 
 to moor a big boat to a pier, you first throw 
 
CHAPTER II. 20, 21 305 
 
 across the intervening gulf a light line. 
 Gulliver's bondage in Lilliput began in the 
 binding down of a single hair ! And our light 
 flirtations with the defiled world, the yielding of 
 a hair here and a hair there to its playful caress, 
 will lead to an eventual entanglement which will 
 make the soul the bond-slave of pollution. To 
 trifle with the world is to play with the plague. 
 " They are again entangled and overcome." 
 
 And what is the moral status of the back- 
 slider ? " The last state is become ivorse with them Verse 20 
 than the firsts Here is a man who has had 
 intimacy with the Lord. By the strength of 
 the holy partnership he has been kept inviolate, 
 and ''no plague has come nigh his dwelling." 
 He dissolves the partnership ; he opens up a 
 lost communion ; he turns like " a dog to his 
 vomit," and " a sow to the mire," and the ap- 
 palling issue is this, that " it were better had he 
 never known the way of righteousness," and the 
 last state of the man is worse than the first ! 
 How is he worse ? In spiritual apprehension. 
 His sense of God is tremendously abused, and 
 he has not the same receptive organ to the 
 Divine that he had when first he sought the 
 Lord. He has not the same appreciation of 
 grace, the same craving for forgiveness, the 
 same hunger for holiness, the same longing for 
 home! How is he worse? In moral dis- 
 
 20 
 
306 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 crimination. His moral palate is not as sensitive 
 as when he first surrendered his life to the King. 
 His mouth is harder ! He can swallow iniquity 
 neat. How is he worse ? In the poverty of his 
 emotional force. The fundamental energies of 
 the life are sluggish or dead, the love -force, the 
 hope-force, the faith-force, the ultimate momenta 
 which constitute the wealth and dignity of man. 
 How is he worse? Because he does not know 
 he is worse ! " Thou sayest I am rich, and have 
 gotten riches, and have need of nothing ; and 
 knowest not that thou art the wretched one and 
 miserable and poor and blind and naked!" " The 
 last state of that man is worse than the first." 
 
 Can such a man be recovered? Oh yes! 
 Backsliders may be converted and recovered. 
 *'He is able to save unto the uttermost!" ^'I 
 will recover thee of thy backsliding." "All 
 things are possible to him that believeth." 
 
 Though earth and hell the word gainsay, 
 The word of God can never fail : 
 
 The Lamb shall take my sins away, 
 'Tis certain, though impossible : 
 
 The thing impossible shall be, 
 
 All things are possible to me. 
 
 All things are possible to God, 
 
 To Christ, the power of God in man, 
 
 To men, when I am all renewed, 
 When I in Christ am formed again, 
 
 And when, from all sin set free. 
 
 All things are possible to me. 
 
THE LEISURELINESS OF GOD. 
 
 2 Peter iii. 3, 4, 8, 9. 
 
 Mochers shall come ivith mockery, walking after their own 
 lusts, and saying. Where is the jyromise of His ptrsence ? . . . 
 One day is ivith the Lord as a thousand years, and a 
 thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concern- 
 ing His promise, as some count slackness ; hut is long suffering 
 to you-ward, not wishing that any should perish, hut that 
 all should come to repentance. 
 
 " Where is the promise of His presence ? " Where Verse i 
 are the signs of the King's presence and 
 ministry ? Where are the prints of His goings ? 
 Show us the proofs of His interposition, the 
 evidences of His revolutionary and transforming 
 work! Eeveal to us the witness of His handi- 
 work, or at any rate let us see and touch the 
 hem of His garment ! " Where is the promise 
 of His presence ? " It is the uproarious cry of 
 the mockers, " walking after their own lusts J^ Verse 3 
 They are proclaiming the heedlessness of the 
 Almighty ; " The Lord God is not moving, with 
 attentive ministry, along the ways of men ! He 
 is far away, in the boundless hunting-ground of 
 space, engaged with larger prey I " 
 
 307 
 
808 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 " Where is the promise of His presence ? " It 
 is not only the shout of the scoffer, it is the low, 
 poignant cry of the devout. The voices in this 
 Book are many and manifold. You can hear the 
 loud, laughing jeer of the mocker, rising in 
 the very midst of prophecy and psalm : and you 
 can you hear the wail of the perplexed, like a 
 low, long moan of pain. " How long wilt Thou 
 forget me, Lord ? " " Lord, how long wilt 
 Thou look on?" ''How long, Lord, how 
 long ? " The defiant and reckless scorn, and the 
 agonising doubt, concern themselves with one 
 thing — the apparent heedlessness of God. 
 
 "What, then, is the problem ? It is this. Men 
 are confronted with an apparently undiscriminat- 
 ing and uncompassionating juggernaut. No 
 hand seems to be busy in human affairs engaged 
 in just and discerning judgment. There is no 
 selection determined by moral worth. The vast 
 movement is blind and capricious. The gigantic 
 machine staggers along, like some untended 
 traction engine, and its huge, grinding wheels 
 bruise and break all things into a common mass, 
 stones and little children, the wasteful and the 
 useful, the sinner and the saint. 
 
 Let me read to you a short passage from one 
 of the most delicate and sensitive of our present- 
 day writers, who thus expresses a part of this 
 sharp and burdensome problem : " Last summer, 
 
CHAPTER III. 3, 4, 8, 9 309 
 
 ) -^j 
 
 as I walked in my gardeiij^ I heard a fledgeling 
 sparrow chirruping merrily under a bush. Pos- 
 sibly he had by accident dropped out of his 
 nest, and, by making parachutes of his wings, 
 had so broken his fall as to reach ground 
 without taking hurt, and was now in a flutter, 
 between pride and fear, at his own daring. For 
 a few minutes I watched him ruffling it as 
 roguishly as a robin, now cocking his glossy 
 head at a sprawling worm, now stropping his 
 tiny beak, razor-wise, upon a twig, and twitter- 
 ing lustily meanwhile for very joy of his freedom 
 and of his merry youth and of the summer 
 morning. ... I insinuated myself into my 
 hammock, and with my fingers between the 
 pages of a book, lay a-swing in the sunshine as 
 in the centre of a golden globe. For a time I 
 forgot both book and bird. Then suddenly my 
 golden globe shattered into darkness at a sound 
 — a mere thimbleful of sound — a scream of 
 terror and agony, so tiny and yet so haunting 
 and so horrible, that I seem to hear it even now. 
 A tame rook that has the run of my garden had 
 pinned the sparrow, breast upward, under his 
 talons, and, as I looked, was stabbing the life 
 out of him with iron beak. For that wee bird 
 no happy warbling among the leaves: no 
 happier rearing of his young. . . . The sight of 
 that helpless nestling, done to death in the June 
 
310 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 sunshine, and by one of his feathered kin, turned 
 me sick and faint with horror." " Where is the 
 promise of His presence ? " 
 
 I had just written these words when an urgent 
 letter was placed upon my desk. I paused in my 
 work to open and read it, and this sentence gave 
 its crimson hue to deepen the colour of my page : 
 *' We have had another physician to see her, and 
 he pronounces the disease to be cancer." The 
 victim is an incarnate angel, who has moved 
 along the hard roads of life with all the sweeten- 
 ing and reviving ministry of a perfume. Her 
 life has been a daily death; she has acquired 
 only that she might give again, she has spent 
 herself in order that by the energy of sacrificial 
 blood others might be made alive. And now, 
 cancer ! " We have had another physician to 
 see her, and he pronounces the disease to be 
 cancer." That cancer should have come to her ! 
 ** Where is the promise of His presence ? " 
 
 The same morning I had read these words in 
 my daily paper: "The 6th Company of the 
 23rd Siberian Eegiment reached the summit, 
 and rushed in the Japanese defences. They 
 were, however, received with fixed bayonets, the 
 captain being lifted into the air by several 
 Japanese on the points of their weapons. The 
 rest of the company all perished before the 
 companies following could get up. This is the 
 
CHAPTEE III. 3, 4, 8, 9 311 
 
 tenth day such a butchery has been going on. 
 The Turkish War was a joke to this ! Over 
 all this vast field of action, an area of thirty 
 miles, the ground is strewn with the dead, and 
 tens of thousands of human wrecks are being 
 carried south and north from this unexampled 
 battlefield." Let that gory record add its quota 
 to the already deeply dyed and troubled page. 
 ** Where is the promise of His presence? ^^ 
 
 And that is not all. The difficulty is accen- 
 tuated when one turns from the victims to some 
 of those who apparently escape. Notoriously 
 bad men are housed in comfort, and useless 
 women are clothed in silks and satins, and walk 
 the sunny side of the way. Dishonesty sweeps 
 by in the carriage, while integrity creeps foot- 
 sore by the kerb. "Fools ride on horseback, 
 while princes walk by their side." The sleep of 
 the beast is untroubled, while the saint moans 
 through the night in pain. The contrasts are 
 apparently appalling, and fortune does not 
 favour the brave ! " Where is the promise of His 
 presence ? " 
 
 What shall we say to these things? Let 
 us say, first of all, that we are very ignorant, 
 that our eyes are only endowed with short 
 range, and that our knowledge has severe and 
 almost immediate limitations. Do not let us 
 regard our uncertain guessings as final judg- 
 
312 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 ments. Let us admit the mystery, and cease 
 our bitter dogmatisms until the mist has rolled 
 away. How little we know ! That little fledgling, 
 done to death by the rook, how little we know 
 about him ! The dropping from the nest, his 
 little chirp, his material equipment, the scream 
 and ... we know no more ! " If God saw fit," 
 says our literary friend, " to set that little creature 
 singing in the green groves of Paradise (and who 
 dare say that God has no place in His universe 
 for the sparrow, that God Himself has told us is 
 evermore within His care !), if God saw fit, at 
 the cost of a moment's pain, to take His bird — 
 where danger shall menace never more, what is 
 that to you ? " Our range of vision is ineffective, 
 and we haven't the evidence to justify a harsh 
 and bitter verdict. 
 
 My cancer-stricken friend, how little I know 
 about her! And sometimes in my thinking I 
 do not include all the little I know. I called her 
 " victim " ; the strange thing is that she would 
 never use the word about herself, and her 
 thoughts about herself are part of the case. I 
 refuse to allow any verdict upon her which takes 
 no account of her peace, and resignation, and 
 deep and unsmitten faith. I can hold no parley 
 with judges who keep their eyes glued upon the 
 corroding disease, and pay no regard to her long 
 and radiant vista of immortal hope. I say that 
 
CHAPTER III. 3, 4, 8, 9 313 
 
 the " victim's " assurance is part of the problem, 
 and must not be ignored in the verdict. 
 
 The fact of the matter is, our thoughts are 
 moving upon an altogether inadequate scale. 
 That is the teaching of this chapter to troubled 
 and doubt-stricken men. " One day is with the verse 8 
 Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years 
 as one day.^^ We are not thinking on a suffi- 
 ciently adequate scale : our thoughts cannot 
 wrap themselves about the entirety of the place. 
 We know what ministry an enlarged scale 
 accomplishes even for some of the smaller 
 things which lie in the term of human years. 
 A thing looked at in the scale of one day is 
 quite a different matter when set in the scale 
 of seventy years. The scale of one day 
 obscures purpose and tendency, and veils '' the 
 far-off interest of tears." I lately read some 
 extracts from a printed diary, and I would like 
 to read you a part of them. The first is from 
 the diary of a boy, and I will give it just as 
 it appears.* " I cannot pretend to like this 
 school, however much I try. The head is a 
 beast, and not one of the under masters is 
 a decent chap. I hate being kept in after 
 hours when the other fellows are going out 
 to games, yet, whenever I haven't done a 
 lesson right they make me do it until I know 
 * Blake's A ReasonaUe View of Life. 
 
314 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 it thoroughly. This is constantly the case 
 with my Latin. Also I do loathe the food they 
 give us ; we have to eat fat and lean together, 
 and fat is beastly. Also, however cold it is, 
 we have to take long runs when it would be 
 much nicer to sit by the fire and be comfortable. 
 Also I can't understand my father and mother, 
 who say they love me and all that, sending 
 me to such a place.'* 
 
 Just fifty years later the same hand wrote 
 these words, when the writer's name was known 
 throughout the world. " Of my many advan- 
 tages in early life, I place easily first my 
 parents, whose particular method of training 
 me was beyond all praise. ... In looking back 
 upon my first school, I can think of it only 
 with affection, for the manner in which the 
 masters treated my inert tendency of character 
 was entirely admirable. To their insistence at 
 that period I owe one of the keenest delights 
 of my maturer years, a love for •the Latin 
 authors. ... In the matter of physical sound- 
 ness, also, I am certainly much indebted to the 
 school runs, which were compulsory, and to the 
 wholesome and sensible diet on which we were 
 fed, without which I should not possess to-day 
 the virility which has kept me free from 
 disease to a quite unusual extent." Need I 
 point the moral of the contrasts? The boy's 
 
CHAPTER III. 3, 4, 8, 9 315 
 
 entry enshrines a verdict fashioned upon tlie 
 scale of a day : the man's entry declares a 
 judgment fashioned to the scale of fifty years. 
 It is all a matter of scale ! " One day is with 
 the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand 
 years as one day." In things of the day He 
 has in view the thousand years ; the thousand 
 years being the full maturing of the designs 
 that moulded the little day. "Where is the 
 promise of His presence ? " Think upon the 
 scale of a thousand years. 
 
 But in the chapter before us the mocker's 
 scorn primarily concerns the heedlessness of 
 God in the face of human sin. They are happy 
 and untroubled in their lust ! The jeer is this, 
 that God is heedless of sin or virtue, and that 
 there are no signs of discriminating judgment 
 between the open sinner and the professed 
 saint. Is God heedless about sin ? " "Where 
 is the promise of His presence ? " Are there 
 any signs of His whereabouts ? Let us ask 
 ourselves this searching question — how do 
 things trend ? Is God heedless concerning sin ? 
 To what tribunal can we make our appeal? 
 We can appeal to the testimony of the purest 
 instincts. We can appeal to the witness of 
 personal experience. We can appeal to the 
 proclamation of the Christian Scriptures. And 
 what is their united teaching ? It is this — that 
 
ai6 THE SECOND EPISTLE OE PETEB 
 
 there is nothing more sure than " the ever- 
 lasting burnings." I do not refer to some 
 remote and unseen hell, the appointed destiny 
 of an impenitent race. I refer to a present 
 conflagration, the everlasting burning, in which 
 the sinner is even now being inevitably con- 
 sumed. I say that instinct and experience 
 agree in this, that sin has to encounter an 
 unavoidable Nemesis, and that wrong moves 
 on to certain destruction. Our proverbial 
 lore, the findings and expressions of the com- 
 mon life, gives emphatic utterance to the same 
 truth. " A man's chickens come home to 
 roost." " The whirligig of time brings round 
 its revenges." " Sin doesn't pay in the long 
 run." What the proverb declares, our ex- 
 periences confirm. There is not a single sinner 
 in this town to-day who is not, even now, in 
 *Hhe devouring fire," " the everlasting burnings." 
 You say that some of them seem very happy 
 in the fire! Yes, they do, but don't you see 
 that their happiness is not a disproof, but the 
 very proof of the conflagration. Degradation 
 is penalty. Loss of fine perception is penalty. 
 The destruction of the coronal powers is 
 penalty. Is it no sign of horrible judgment 
 that a man is satisfied with the pleasures of 
 the kitchen, when the oratory of his life is 
 ablaze ? This is the plane of true and cogent 
 
CHAPTER, 111. a, 4, 8, 9 317 
 
 reasoning; manhood maimed is manhood 
 penalised. That men are contented to be as 
 pigs in the mire is the clearest evidence that 
 their crowns and dignities have been burnt 
 away. In the early stages of their sin men 
 are conscious of their loss, and they busy 
 themselves in fashioning counterfeits. They 
 employ divers kinds of religious cosmetics. 
 They strive and strive to " keep up appear- 
 ances" even when the internal treasure is 
 destroyed ! My God ! no judgment in the world ? 
 No Nemesis ? No fire ? Is not this a most 
 awful judgment, more awful than any other, 
 that when the very virtues of a man are con- 
 sumed away, he should move about in self- 
 satisfaction, wearing a hollow and painted 
 pretence ? You want to see visible lightning 
 appear and strike him! Our God uses the 
 ministry of a more secret consumption. " Our 
 God is a consuming fire." 
 
 As it is with individuals so it is with peoples. 
 Judgment haunts the footsteps of the sinful 
 state. "We can trace the decline and fall of 
 Eome. We can track it step by step through 
 increased idleness, through demoralising em- 
 ployment, through heated sensuality, through 
 the decline of agricultural pursuits, through 
 the lapse of military virtue, on through all to 
 Imperial perdition. There are grave and sober- 
 
318 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 minded men who axe beginning to think that 
 Nemesis is revealing a visible hand in the 
 Russia of to-day. As for Britain, let her 
 remember that, whatever adhesion may be 
 found in material and commercial communion, 
 it is not in these things that she will find the 
 cement of an enduring and indestructible empire. 
 *' Righteousness alone exalteth a nation." In 
 men and in peoples we may be sure that our 
 sin will find us out. All sin works towards 
 decline, insipidity, impotence, and night. Of 
 all sad spectacles, the saddest is the spectacle 
 of the candle smouldering out in an ill-spent 
 life ! " Remember now thy Creator in the days 
 of thy youth, ere the evil days come," the 
 insipid, burnt-out days, " when thou shalt say, 
 I have no pleasure in them." 
 
 And yet, after all, Grod does appear leisurely. 
 "Why does He not hasten His goings? Why 
 are not sin and perdition more closely joined ? 
 Why does He move at such a leisurely pace ? 
 Verse 9 Why is He so slack ? Listen. " The Lord is 
 not slack concerning His jpromise^ as some count 
 slackness; but is longsuffering to you-ivard^ 
 not luishing that any shoidd perish^ but that 
 all should come to repentance^ " Not slack, 
 as some count slackness," not impotent, not 
 indifferent, not unwilling to perform. What 
 then ? " But is longsuffering toward you." It 
 
CHAPTER III. 3, 4, 8, 9 319 
 
 is the leisnreliness, not of heedlessness, but of 
 mercy. Our God is '* slow to wrath " ; it is a 
 slow fire, slow in order that we may have 
 opportunity to repent. God's judgment on sin 
 could have been appallingly swift and final. 
 He might have ordained that one revolt should 
 incur the paralysis of the will and the ruin of 
 the life. And what would have been the effect ? 
 That we should have moved in a trembling 
 terror, and though we might have been virtuous 
 we should never have been free. The lowest 
 motive would have operated in the soul, and 
 the lowest motive can never produce the highest 
 life. Some graces would never have ripened; 
 we might have been pure, we could never have 
 been genial and sweet. And so our Lord is 
 apparently '' slack " ; He is " slow to wrath " ; 
 and by the very slowness He gives to us a 
 gracious opportunity for reflection, a chance 
 for the awaking of the affections, and room for 
 the ministry of repentance. The far-off 
 psalmist had discerned the secret of the Lord 
 when he said : " Therefore will the Lord wait 
 that He may be gracious unto you" " The Lord 
 is not slack ... as some count slackness ; 
 but is longsuffering to you-ward, not wishing 
 that any should perish, but that all should 
 come to repentance." Let us give thanks at 
 the remembrance of God's leisureliness ! 
 
320 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETEE 
 
 How have I Thy Spirit grieved 
 
 Since first with me He strove, 
 Obstinately disbelieved, 
 
 And trampled on Thy love! 
 I have sinned against the light ; 
 
 I have broke from Thy embrace, 
 No, I would not, when I might 
 
 Be freely saved by grace. 
 
 After all that I have done 
 
 To drive Thee from my heart ! 
 Still Thou wilt not leave Thine own, 
 
 Thou wilt not yet depart. 
 Wilt not give the sinner o'er ; 
 
 Ready art Thou now to save, 
 Bidst me come, as heretofore, 
 
 That I Thy life may have. 
 
PEEPAEINa FOR THE JUDGMENT 
 
 2 Peter iii. 10-14 
 
 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief ; in the 
 which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and 
 the elements shall he dissolved with fervent heat, and the 
 earth arud the works that are therein shall he burned up. 
 Seeing that these things are thus all to be dissolved, what 
 manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy living and 
 godliness, looking for and earnestly desiring the coming of 
 the day of God, by reason of which the heavens being on fire 
 shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent 
 Jieat ? But, according to His promise, we look for new 
 heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. 
 Wherefore, beloved^ seeing that ye look for these things, 
 give diligence that ye may be found in peace, without spot 
 and blameless in His sight. 
 
 " Seeing that ye look for these things." What verse 14 
 things ? Let us glance back at the descriptive 
 record of the outlook. " The day of the Lord verse 10 
 will come as a thief; in the which the heavens shall 
 pass away with a great noise^ and the elements 
 shall be dissolved with fervent heatj and the earth 
 and the works that are therein shall be burned up.^^ 
 Here is an apostle vividly anticipating an 
 awful day of judgment. In that final judgment 
 righteousness is to be triumphantly vindicated, 
 
 321 21 
 
322 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 and iniquity is to be irrevocably overwhelmed. 
 The coming of the day is sure ; the time of its 
 dawning is uncertain. It will assuredly come, 
 but it will come as a thief! The affairs of all 
 men are moving forward to consummation and 
 crisis. There are details in the apostle's out- 
 look, the mere drapery of the expectation, 
 which I do not profess to understand, and which 
 I shall make no attempt to explain. But alto- 
 gether apart from the mysterious vestures in 
 which the judgment is clothed, there are three 
 outstanding characteristics of this stupendous 
 crisis in the history of the soul. The antici- 
 pated judgment is to be a time of dissolution. 
 *' The heavens shall pass away with a great 
 noise, and the elements shall be dissolved with 
 a fervent heat, and the earth and the works that 
 are therein shall be burned up." With the 
 material details in this description I am not 
 now concerned. It is sufEcient for me to receive 
 this cardinal impression : that the judgment is 
 to be a season of convulsion, of upheaval, of 
 exposure of foundations, of the dissolution and 
 exhibition of the component parts of things. 
 In that day it is to be revealed of what ele- 
 mentary substance things and characters are 
 made. And, secondly, the anticipated judgment 
 is to be a time of discrimination. This out- 
 standing event is to mark not merely a culmina- 
 
CHAPTER III. 10-14 323 
 
 tion, but a crisis. Things are to be analysed 
 and tested, and judged by the pattern in the 
 mount, and there is to be a separation of part 
 from part, of character from character, of the 
 healthy from the corrupt. " The wicked shall 
 not stand in the judgment." And, thirdly, it is 
 to be a time of transformation. Out of the dis- 
 solution and discrimination is to arise a changed 
 world. " According to His promise, we look for Verse 13 
 new heavens and a new earth, ivherein divelleth 
 righteousness J ^ Out of the crisis is to be born 
 a new morning, with new light and new atmo- 
 sphere, and a new home, and a new spirit 
 pervading all things. Such are the pre-eminent 
 characteristics of this overwhelming event in 
 which every earthly life is to culminate in the 
 judgment presence of God. 
 
 And now with this foreground of severe and 
 sanctified expectancy, the apostle proclaims the 
 following challenge : " Seeing that these things are Verse 11 
 thus all to he dissolved, what manner of persons 
 ought ye to heV^ How ought men to live in the 
 face of a hereafter and a sure and awe-inspiring 
 judgment ? "With that towering possibility con- 
 fronting us, which to the apostle was a great 
 and solemn certainty, with what kind of 
 ambition ought we to direct and control our 
 days ? Let us mark the coolness and sanity 
 of the apostle's reply. For there is nothing 
 
324 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 heated in his speech, nothing feverish, nothing 
 sensational and fanatical. He does not tremble 
 in paralysing fear ; he does not maim his life by 
 ascetical severities. Looking upon this super- 
 lative event, his life is cool and calm, full-toned 
 Verse 14 and healthy. " Seeing that ye look for these things^ 
 give diligence that ye may be found in peace, with- 
 out spot and Uameless in His sights That is not 
 counsel for men in their decrepitude, when their 
 evening time is come, and their sun is in the 
 west, and the shout and struggle are over, and 
 the fight and feast are done ; it is counsel for 
 life in its morning and its pride, counsel which 
 seeks the creation of a rich and consecrated 
 character, full-blooded and effective all along 
 the changing way. If there be a judgment, as 
 there will be, if there be a morrow of crisis, as 
 there surely will, then in these robes we may 
 meet it with eager and fearless face ; " In peace, 
 without spot and blameless in His sight." 
 
 Now let us look a little more closely at those 
 features of the character which will stand 
 Verse 14 triumphant in the judgment. " Found in peace^ 
 Let us once again rid ourselves of the common 
 interpretation of peace. In the ordinary mind 
 peace is synonymous with quietness and rest. 
 We are walking up Ludgate Hill at noon, and 
 we are jostled by the hurrying and perspiring 
 crowd, and we turn from the hurrying multitudes 
 
CHAPTER III. 10-14 325 
 
 into the cool quietness of St. Paul's Cathedral, 
 and we are tempted to say to ourselves, How 
 peaceful it is ! Or we go into some little village 
 church, hoary with the passage of many years, 
 and with no sound disturbing the stillness 
 except the occasional song of a bird which 
 steals tenderly through the open window, and 
 again we use the pregnant word, How peaceful ! 
 Or we go into the chamber of the dead, and 
 we look at the body with the wrinkles wiped 
 out, and the once-while weary limbs lying in 
 undisturbed rest, and again we say. How peaceful 
 it is ! But these are not the symbols of Christian 
 peace, however pertinently they may express 
 the secret of stillness. Peace is not stillness, 
 but a certain kind of movement. It is move- 
 ment without friction : cog works into cog with 
 perfect and noiseless harmony : everything 
 moves without jar, and there is no grit in the 
 wheels. Peace is not the presence of noise, but 
 the absence of discord. When we dig away to 
 the very roots of the word we find its primary 
 content is " perfect joining." Nothing works 
 out of its place. Everything moves in every- 
 thing else with delightful confluence. And 
 this is peace, and therefore peace is harmony ; 
 it is the absence of the rebel, the extinction of 
 strife. And so if there is to be peace in my 
 life, all the powers in my life must co-operate 
 
326 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 without friction and move in harmony under 
 the supreme control of the sovereign will of 
 God. Here is a musical instrument, the organ. 
 It is a very complex instrument, containing I 
 know not how many hundred parts. And there 
 is a movement in the organ known as ciphering. 
 And what is ciphering ? It is the sounding of 
 an organ-pipe, in consequence of some derange- 
 ment or maladjustment, independently of the 
 action of the player. Harmony is dependent 
 upon the obedience of each note to the organist's 
 authority. If any note breaks out of its own 
 accord, the harmony is broken, and we are the 
 victims of jarring discord. Now every man's 
 individuality is like a complex organ. How 
 manifold and varied are the component parts ! 
 And the harmony of the individual is dependent 
 upon the co-operation of all his powers. And 
 yet how frequently the harmony of the life is 
 broken by the ciphering of a part ! Some 
 faculty is rebellious, and breaks away from 
 the control of the will. How often the player 
 upon the instrument has to confess, " I cannot 
 control my temper ! " or, '' I cannot control 
 my imagination ! " or, " I cannot control my 
 passions ! " But there is this distinction between 
 ourselves and the musical instrument. The 
 organist at the keyboard has no control over 
 the ciphering; it is independent of him, and 
 
CHAPTER III. 10-14 327 
 
 works entirely away from his resources and 
 his will. But the individual has resources at 
 his disposal, offered to him by his Lord, 
 resources found in the dynamics of grace, by 
 which every faculty can be subjected to the 
 holy purpose of our Lord. It is possible for 
 the individual to be " found in peace," and for 
 " all that is within me " to bless God's holy name. 
 Let us investigate a little more in detail this 
 manifold organ of the individual self. There 
 are my powers of body. These are to be " found 
 in peace." They are to work in harmony with 
 one another, and under the control of the 
 sovereign will of God, and they are to move as 
 common subjects of the King. " Present your 
 bodies." "We must bring our basal energies 
 to the Lord, and have these bodily forces 
 subdued to the higher harmonies, like the 
 profound notes of the organ that give body and 
 fulness to its tender and sweetening strains. 
 " Let the ape and tiger die," sings Tennyson. 
 But there is a better way. And the better 
 way is to transform them. I do not want my 
 passions annihilating; I want them turning to 
 useful force. I want the sword changed into 
 a ploughshare, and the spear into a pruning- 
 hook, and I want the beast at the base 
 harnessed to the imperial and holy purpose of 
 God. If a man consecrates " the ape and tiger " 
 
328 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 to the Lord, and these are brought into 
 obedience under the Lord's control, the life 
 will receive a tremendous driving-power, and 
 every holy ambition will be pursued with almost 
 violent zest. "I keep my body under," says 
 the Apostle Paul. " I allow no ciphering ! " 
 Every bodily desire is held in the leash, and 
 all work together, and are ''found in peace." 
 
 There are my powers of mind. We speak of 
 wandering thoughts, thoughts that are rebellious 
 to the general dominion, and that steal away 
 to forbidden fields. We have unrestrained 
 imaginations, fancies that go off on their own 
 charges and ask no question concerning the 
 lands in which they roam. " Bring every 
 thought into captivity to Christ." It is possible 
 for all our mental powers to be " found in 
 peace." We have more power over our 
 thoughts than we frequently conceive. There 
 is much reserve of authority which has not 
 yet been exercised. We can refuse a thought 
 expression, and that refusal enormously 
 strengthens our seK-control. ''Give no unpro- 
 portioned thought its act." Make every 
 thought bow down to Jesus before you give 
 it utterance ! But if we still find that our 
 sovereignty is ineffective we can refer our 
 weakness to the Spirit. We can take these 
 rebel thoughts and imaginings, and we can 
 
CHAPTER m. 10-14 829 
 
 say to the Holy Spirit, "These thoughts, my 
 great Companion, are beyond me ! I have no 
 power to deal with them ! I hand them over 
 to thee ! " And marvellous is the efficacy of 
 the reference ! Marvellous is the re-arranging 
 of this disordered world, and the subjection of 
 the mental chaos into harmony and peace. 
 
 And there are my jpowers of soul. There are 
 the superlative senses in my life. These also 
 must be " found in peace." Our sense of right 
 must not be allowed to join the rebel forces of 
 mere expediency. Our sense of the sublime 
 must not be permitted to career after degrading 
 superstitions. Our highest powers must pay 
 obeisance in the holy place, and acknowledge 
 in awed communion the holiness of the Lord. 
 All this is peace, for this is harmony, the 
 powers of body and of mind and of soul all 
 co-operating in producing the music of the 
 spheres, the melody which is well-pleasing unto 
 God. And this is the character with which 
 one can confidently meet the day of judgment. 
 "Give diligence that ye may be found in 
 peace." 
 
 Now turn to the second of the characteristics 
 of the triumphant life: '-''found . . . without yerse u 
 spoty Let us mark the significance of the 
 word. It describes a life distressed by no 
 infirmity and corrupted by no disease. It is 
 
330 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 neither lame nor defiled. Our God desires tlie 
 entire life, and He resents a defective offering. 
 He wants " a lamb witout spot." None of our 
 powers are to be made infirm by disease, and 
 none are to be rendered diseased by abuse. Is 
 not tbis a sane and reasonable teaching? 
 Surely this man's mind is in no degree im- 
 paired by the spectacle of coming judgment! 
 His ambition is to be diligent— to present 
 himself healthy, with every part of his being 
 in working order. We may vary in the quality 
 of our endowments, but there need be no 
 variety in their purity. One man may have 
 ten talents, and another man only one, but in 
 both instances the life can be perfectly clean. 
 One man's endowment may be as that of a 
 cathedral organ, while another may be common- 
 place as an ordinary harmonium, but both can 
 be kept in perfect purity, no part corrupted, 
 and every part sounding out the obedient note. 
 And the third characteristic of the triumphant 
 character is described in the succeeding phrase, 
 Yerseu'' without blame:' Is that possible? I may get 
 my body under, and I may succeed, by the 
 grace of God, in freeing every part of my being 
 from infirmity and disease, but is it within the 
 bounds of possibiUty that I can stand in the 
 judgment "without blame"? I think of my 
 life. I retrace its steps. I mark its deliberate 
 
CHAPTER III. 10-14 331 
 
 rebellions, its sins of selfishness and desire, its 
 injustices in speech and deed, its disloyalties 
 and secret treacheries. How can such a life 
 ever be found "without blame"? And yet it 
 is gloriously possible. It is the very evangel of 
 grace that, on the day of judgment, men whose 
 lives were once defiled can stand before the 
 Almighty, and no word of blame or rebuke 
 shall fall upon their ears. They shall come to 
 judgment, but there shall be no condemnation. 
 "There is therefore now no condemnation to 
 them that are in Christ Jesus." I saw a 
 man a little while ago with the marks of 
 his old rebellion still seated in his face; but 
 behind that disfigured countenance there was 
 the illuminating presence of the light of life, 
 and that man shall stand in the judgment 
 "without blame." But this can only be possible 
 when the life is lost "in Christ." We are 
 regarded and judged as being in Him. What 
 He is we are, for as He is we shall one day 
 assuredly become. " Our life is hid with Christ." 
 It may be only poor as yet, and the footprints 
 of the beast may be scarcely erased from our 
 life, but one day we are to be manifested in 
 His beauty. It fills me with amazement that I, 
 once a vagrant, and bearing about with me 
 signs of my degeneracy, shall one day "walk 
 in His likeness." Yes, and those old days, 
 
332 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 those pitiably blighted days, are never to be 
 named by Him in whose holy presence we are 
 all to stand. "I will remember them against 
 thee no more for ever." 
 
 Rock of Ages, cleft for me, 
 Let me hide myself in Thee. 
 
 Here, then, is a great ambition — that on the 
 awful day of unveiling we may thus be '^ found 
 in peace, without spot, and blameless." And 
 see with what intensity this apostolic ambition 
 is to be pursued. The apostle uses three very 
 
 Verse 14 strenuous figures of speech. "5e diligent.'' It 
 is again the favourite image of the business 
 man. We are to pursue the riches of this 
 finished character with all the ardour of an 
 expert man of affairs. We are to be inventive 
 and earnest and prompt, buying up every oppor- 
 tunity for moral and spiritual enrichment. 
 
 Verse 17 "beware .^" And secondly we are to have all 
 the vigilance of a custodian. Having got a 
 pearl, I am to guard it as one of the crown 
 jewels. "Hold fast that which thou hast; let 
 no man take thy crown." And thirdly, we 
 are to "6e stedfasV We are to manifest the 
 unshakeable and unshrinkable loyalty of a 
 soldier at the post of duty. In seeking this 
 glorified character we are to stand faithful at 
 our post, " and having done all, to stand." Go 
 forward to the judgment, seeking peace and 
 
CHAPTEE III. 10-14 333 
 
 spotlessness and blamelessness with, all the 
 diligence of a business man, with all the vigil- 
 ance of a watchman, and with all the daring 
 obedience of a soldier on tbe field of battle. 
 
 A life like that, hiding in Christ and always 
 cherishing the Father's business, need fear 
 nothing that the morrow may bring. For that 
 kind of life the judgment will have no terrors. 
 If we live toward God we shall not fear to see 
 Him. Nay, here is tbe apostle bold enough to 
 use these very daring and exuberant words, 
 "earnestly desiring the coming of that day." 
 It is the very music of this Epistle. " That 
 day!" "At that day!" I say it is music to 
 the apostle, as indeed it was music to the Apostle 
 Paul, who gloried in "the crown of righteous- 
 ness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall 
 give me at that day, and not unto me only, but 
 unto all them also that love His appearing." 
 
GEOWING IN GRACE 
 
 2 Peter iii. 18 
 
 Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and 
 Saviour Jesus Christ. 
 
 If these words, and indeed the nature and 
 contents of all this wonderful chapter, were 
 not penned by Simon Peter, they were com- 
 posed by his "double" in the spirit. Their 
 hearts are fashioned alike. The writer of this 
 counsel has had Simon Peter's experience, and 
 he is possessed by Simon Peter's penitence, and 
 he shares Simon Peter's trembling confidence 
 and hope. If some firmly authenticated and 
 altogether non-suspicious letter of the great 
 apostle were to fall into my hands, this is the 
 kind of matter, and this the manner, which I 
 should expect in its intense and impetuous 
 pages. I should expect much about pitfalls 
 and snares, much about finely attired and spe- 
 cious seductions, much about secret treachery, 
 cowardly denial, and open revolt. I should 
 expect strong and jubilant evangels, proclaim- 
 ing the capacity of frail and fragile man to 
 
 334 
 
CHAPTER III. 18 335 
 
 become the loyal and bosom friend of God 
 Almighty. I should expect glorious vistas of 
 distant possibility, bright and alluring, the 
 ultimate bourn of human life in fellowship 
 with the Divine. All these I should expect 
 from the hands and lips and heart of this great 
 apostle — once impulsive, and cowardly, and dis- 
 loyal, but now recovered, emboldened, glorified 
 in the recreating power of the Holy Ghost. 
 And they are all here, messages full of heart- 
 ening, serious with warning, kindling with 
 inspiration, and all of them culminating in this 
 cheery word of sanctified Christian optimism, 
 *' Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord 
 and Saviour Jesus Christ." Yes, it is Simon 
 Peter, or his " double," the man who had the 
 two-fold experience of weeping bitterly in the 
 cold twilight of the betrayal morning, and of 
 gazing, with hungry, loving eagerness into the 
 reconciled countenance of the risen Lord. 
 
 Well, here in my text there is suggested a 
 marvellous dignity, the supreme prerogative 
 and endowment of human-kind, our capacity 
 to receive the Divine. " Grow in the grace and 
 knoivledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus ChristJ^ 
 Let us humanise it. To grow in a thing im- 
 plies that I have the power to acquire it. 
 Acquisition implies susceptibility, power of re- 
 ception. When a man counsels me to grow, 
 
836 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 he suggests that I am in possession of a germ- 
 inal aptitude, in the development of which the 
 growth consists. " Grow in Art, and in the 
 knowledge of the Masters of Art ! " Such 
 counsel implies that I possess initial artistic 
 instincts, a certain elementary sensitiveness, 
 which will respond to the revelations of each 
 succeeding stage in the unfolding apocalypse 
 of form and colour. If I am to grow in the 
 grace and knowledge of Turner I must funda- 
 mentally possess the primal instincts of which 
 the ultimate Turner is made. Growth implies 
 a germ, an initial bias or tendency, an original 
 aptitude or gift. And if I am to " grow in the 
 grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ," the con- 
 soling and inspiring suggestion is this, that I 
 am not passive and ungifted like a splint from 
 i a planet, or a mineral in the mine, but that to 
 me has been given an original capability, an 
 innate possibility of holding commerce with the 
 infinite God. "We are fragments of Divinity ! 
 
 Here then, I start with this glorious and 
 marvellous implication, that the children of men 
 have the power to apprehend and to growingly 
 appropriate the "things" of the Spirit of God. 
 Let us look at the capacity. " Grow in graced 
 We have the capacity to receive the Divine 
 energy, to receive it more and more ; to so grow 
 in the appropriation of it that we are at last 
 
CHAPTEE III. 18 337 
 
 " filled with the fulness of God." For Grace is 
 an energy; it is the Divine energy; it is the 
 energy of the Divine affection rolling abundantly 
 to the shores of human need. Oh, it is this, 
 and much more than this ! Its manifold wealth 
 eludes the span of human speed, and refuses to 
 be defined. Grace is indefinable. Dr. Dale, 
 with his strong hands and yet most exquisite 
 touch, endeavoured to express its secret in a 
 pregnant phrase, but he laid down his pen in 
 despair. " Grace," he says, " is love which 
 passes beyond all claims to love. It is love 
 which, after fulfilling the obligations imposed 
 by law, has an unexhausted wealth of kindness." 
 Yes, it is all that ; but when we have said all 
 that, the half hath not been told. It reminds 
 me of an experience in my life a little while 
 ago. Some minister of the Cross, toiling in 
 great loneliness, among a scattered and primitive 
 people, and on the very fringe of dark primeval 
 forests, sent me a little sample of his vast 
 and wealthy environment. He sent it in an 
 envelope. It was a bright and gaily-coloured 
 wing of a native bird. The colaur and life 
 of trackless leagues sampled within the con- 
 fines of an envelope ! And when we have 
 made a compact little phrase to enshrine the 
 secret of grace, I feel that, however fair and 
 radiant it may be, we have only got a wing 
 
 22 
 
338 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 of a native bird, and bewildering stretches of 
 wealth are untouched and unrevealed. No, we 
 cannot define it. Who can define an Alp ? We 
 may describe the varying aspects of a mountain, 
 some of its ever-changing moods ; we can add 
 feature to feature, characteristic to characteristic, 
 but we can never say that we have exhausted 
 the significance of its wealthy face. And so it 
 is with grace. We may have glimpses of its 
 features and varying moods. Even when we can- 
 not construe its'ultimate secret, we may describe 
 when we cannot define. Now that is just what 
 the New Testament permits us to do. It gives 
 us a glimpse here, and a glimpse there, and we 
 can put bit to bit, feature to feature, until we 
 are overwhelmed with the glory of the revelation 
 of God's redeeming grace ! Let us put them 
 together. Grace is energy. Grace is love- 
 energy. Grace is a redeeming love-energy. 
 Grace is a redeeming love-energy ministering to 
 the unlovely, and endowing the unlovely with 
 its own loveliness. Wherever I see grace at 
 work in the Christian Scriptures it is ever a 
 minister of purity, and joy, and song and peace. 
 Cast your eyes over these ! '' Where sin 
 abounded, grace did much more abound." Like 
 as you have seen the shore littered with filth 
 and refuse, and the infinite deep has rolled in, 
 and gathered up the uncleanness into its own 
 
CHAPTER III. 18 339 
 
 purifying flood ! " We liave good hope through 
 grace." Like as the light in the lighthouse 
 burns clear and steadly through the night, 
 because of the unfailing and carefully adminis- 
 tered supplies of oil, so the light of a cheery 
 optimism burns strong and calmly in the night 
 of life, because of the unfailing supplies of 
 grace ! " Singing with grace in your hearts 
 unto the Lord." Didn't I say that grace is the 
 mother of song ? Grace makes a light and 
 nimble atmosphere ; the soul becomes buoyant, 
 and breaks into music as instinctively as the 
 bird sings in the soft airs of the dawn. 
 All this is the work of the love-energy 
 of the Eternal God, and the evangel is this, 
 that to you and me is given the capacity to 
 receive it, to grow in it, to appropriate it more 
 and more, to more and more become its home. 
 " He giveth grace for grace," until every tissue 
 and function in body, mind, and soul are saturated 
 and sanctified in its redeeming ministry. " Grow 
 in grace ! " 
 
 " And in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour 
 Jesus Christ r Then we have not only capacity 
 to receive the Divine energy, but capacity to 
 perceive the Divine character. Gifts of recep- 
 tion are succeeded by gifts of perception. We 
 are to " grow in knowledge " too. I heard a 
 great Bible student say the other day — he is a 
 
340 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 man of most delicate spiritual insight, and has 
 worked and walked with his Lord for many 
 years — and he was speaking among a few familiar 
 friends, and he said, "I feel as if I have only 
 investigated a small garden-bed, and there's a 
 continent still before me ! " Have we not all 
 shared his feelings ? Is there a minister worth 
 his salt who, as his experience broadens and 
 deepens, does not realise that he has only 
 touched the hem of his Master's garment, and that 
 the more glorious intimacy is all before him ? 
 Yes, so far as the Lord Jesus is concerned 
 we have all pottered about a little garden-bed, 
 with a continent awaiting us. But do not 
 let us be despondent or afraid. "We must not 
 measure ourselves by the size of the garden-bed, 
 but by the possibilities of the continent. "We 
 are not scaled to the size of the garden-bed ; we 
 are scaled and endowed to the ultimate demands 
 of the continent. " Now I know in part, but 
 then shall I know even as also I am known ! " 
 The continent is to be as familiar to us 
 as the garden-bed. We can " grow ... in the 
 knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ." Does not that sound continental, that 
 great, all-comprehensive name — Lord — Saviour 
 — Jesus— Christ ? Into the secrets, the deep, 
 bright mysteries of that most wonderful name 
 we are to enter, little by little, and we are to 
 
CHAPTER III. 18 341 
 
 apprehend and appreciate things which have 
 been " hidden from the foundations of the 
 world." Our capacity may at present be infan- 
 tile, but infantile capacity is real, and the 
 undeveloped germ carries in its heart the 
 promise and power of its own prime. Caliban 
 may be dark and imprisoned in contrast with 
 the enlightened and appreciative Paul, but 
 Caliban is a Paul in embryo, and even Paul 
 himself, while he walked the ways of time, had 
 but the comprehension of a babe in comparison 
 with many a poor peasant who had "left his 
 native lea " and had awakened amid the unveiled 
 secrets of the Eternal day. Yes, we can grow ; 
 it is our dignity and our privilege to grow ; we 
 can grow "in the knowledge of our Lord and 
 Saviour Jesus Christ." "Now are we the sons 
 of God," aye, even now! And to what shall 
 we grow ? " It doth not yet appear what we 
 shall be." "What then ? " We know that when 
 He shall appear we shall be like Him, for we 
 shall see Him as He is." For what superlative 
 glories we are made ! Let us even now wear 
 our crowns as kings and queens. 
 
 How, then, can we increase our capacity for 
 God? How may we best "grow in grace and 
 knowledge," in the two-fold gifts of reception 
 and perception ? I only know three ways ; but 
 I think they are all-i»clusive, and they would 
 
342 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 bring a man at length into " the measure of the 
 fulness of the stature of Christ." You will not 
 be surprised when I mention, as the first means 
 of growth, the ministry of fervent prayer. That 
 is an old counsel, almost threadbare by incessant 
 reiteration, but we can no more ignore it than 
 we can ignore the fresh air when we are 
 reckoning up the conditions of physical health. 
 When I speak of prayer I am thinking of a 
 very active and businesslike thing. I think of 
 something far more than speech ; it is commerce 
 with the Infinite. It is the sending out of 
 aspiration, Hke the ascending angels in the 
 patriarch's dream ; it is the reception of inspira- 
 tion, like the descending angels that brought to 
 the weary pilgrim the life and light of God. 
 When we pray, we must drink in, and drink 
 deeply, quietly, consciously, deliberately, the very 
 love-energy of the Eternal God. Marvellous 
 is the ministry of that inspired and inspiring 
 grace ! Shall I tell you how I heard one man 
 speak of another man a little while ago ? 
 The one of whom he spake had appeared weary 
 and worn, and dark, tired lines were pencilled 
 here and there upon his face. And this weary 
 man knelt and prayed ! " And," said my friend, 
 " when he rose from his knees, I saw for the 
 first time the significance of Pentecost ! The 
 weariness had gone ! The dark care-lines were 
 
CHAPTER III. 18 343 
 
 wiped out! His face was all aglow with a 
 renewed flame ! And I verily believe that if 
 my own heart had been pure enough I should 
 have seen a radiant nimbus enveloping his 
 exalted head ! " "What had the weary man been 
 doing on his knees ? He had been growing in 
 grace, and therefore in the knowledge of his 
 Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 
 
 And the second means of growth is found 
 in the ministry of honourable and consecrated 
 labour. If we could not " grow in grace and 
 knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ " while we 
 earn our daily bread, life would be very largely 
 a dark and fruitless waste. But if the hours of 
 labour afford a congenial season for spiritual 
 growth, then life presents a vast and glorious 
 opportunity. It was while the Man of Nazareth 
 was yet working at the carpenter's bench that 
 we are told " He increased in wisdom and stature, 
 and in favour with God and man." " In favmir " 
 — our very present word " grace " : the love- 
 energy of the Eternal streamed into His soul 
 while He engaged in the lowly toil of a humble 
 village craftsman. The business of the little 
 day was so done that at the same time it was 
 commerce with the Infinite ! Every business 
 transaction was so scrupulously pure and 
 honourable as to afford a dwelling-place for the 
 Holy Spirit of the Eternal God! While He 
 
844 THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER 
 
 earned His daily bread He was drawing into 
 His hungry heart the very bread of life. He 
 and His Father were inseparable partners in 
 •the making of a household chair, or in the 
 fashioning of a yoke for the ox of the field. Was 
 not that, too, the restful boast of Stradivari? 
 
 This is my fame — 
 
 When any master holds, 
 Ti'wixt chin and hand a violin of mine, 
 He will be glad that Stradivari lived, 
 Made violinp, and made them of the best. 
 The masters only know whose work is good : 
 They will choose mine : and, while God gives 
 
 them skill, 
 I give them instruments to play upon, 
 
 God choosing me to help Him. 
 
 The man who goes out to his labour in the 
 morning in that spirit, must and will grow 
 in grace and knowledge, and he will find that 
 the common path of duty is even now " close 
 upon the shining tableland to which our God 
 Himself is sun and moon.' ' 
 
 And the third means of growth is to be found 
 in the ministry of unselfish service. In the 
 sphere of the spirit, expenditure is ever the 
 condition of expansion. We get while we give. 
 We grow while we serve. " He that would be 
 great among you let him be your minister." 
 ** He giveth grace to the humble." Aye, it is 
 along that path that we come upon the crown 
 
CHAPTER III. 18 345 
 
 jewels of the King of Kings. " He that loseth 
 his life shall find it." The man who goes out 
 to serve his brother shall meet his God, and 
 shall be partially transfigured into the Saviour's 
 likeness : he shall pass into ever richer acqui- 
 sitions of grace, and he shall be taken into the 
 deeper secrets of his Lord. 
 
Date Due 
 
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