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UNIVERSITY
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EVANSTON
ILLINOIS
ir—
loue apd por^iuepess
reflections suggested by
^ "the greatest thing in the
world"
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS
REFLECTIONS
SUGGESTED BY
"THE GREATEST THING IN THE
WORLD"
ilranslattS from t|)f ffitnnan
*■
BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY
1891
Copyright^ 1891^
Little, Brown, and Company.
^nibarsttg ißress :
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge.
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
I.
Henry Drummond has unfolded to us
with inspiring power " the greatest thing
in the world." With a profound knowledge
of human nature, the unknown author of
" We and the Greatest Thing in the World "
has used the torch offered him by the
Scotch teacher to illuminate the deepest
recesses of the human heart and con¬
sciousness, and, through illustrations from
daily life, to bring Henry Drummond's
more general exhortation unavoidably
near to every one.
Now in all modesty, we should like to
propose the question. To whom is this the
6 LOVB AND FORGIVENESS.
" best thing in the world "? In what way
may the longing heart become possessed
of the heavenly gift of love? Henry
Drummond, it is true, in no way neglects
to touch upon this question. He recalls
the fact that just as the seven colors in
the broken ray of light by artificial union
produce only white, but not light itself, so
neither is it through persistent striving for
certain Christian virtues that love is to be
gained. He declares distinctly that our
love can alone come from the love of God.
"Love begets love," he says. "It is
a process of induction. Put a piece of
iron in the presence of an electrified
body, and that piece of iron for a time
becomes electrified ; it changes into a
temporary magnet in the mere presence
of a permanent magnet, and as long as
you leave the two side by side they are
both magnets alike. Remain side by
side with him who loved and gave him-
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 7
self for us, and you will become a per¬
manent magnet, a permanently magnetic
force; and like him you will draw all
men unto you, like him you will be
drawn unto all men. That is the inevi¬
table effect of love. Any man who
fulfils that cause must have that effect
produced in him."
These words are as beautiful as they
are true; but it seems to us that they
only touch upon the question, without
treating it exhaustively. Even if all
were granted, and it were so easy to
keep one's self to the "cause," so sim¬
ple to rest in Jesus, so that through the
magnetic power of his love our hearts
too were to become love magnets, — how
then is it to be explained that Christian
love is so rarely and with such difficulty
to be found in the world, in spite of the
countless ones who long, strive, and pray
for it.' Or is it that the absorption of
8 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
divine love is not possible for every one
unconditionally? Is not some special
preparedness necessary, in order that this
"process of induction" virhich Drummond
speaks of shall take place? The piece
of iron or steel will indeed become
magnetic through the touch of a mag¬
net, but it can never convey its power
to wood, straw, or glass. Shall not a
similar law in the world of spirit be
recognized? Must not a certain special
condition of the heart be the necessary
preparation for receiving the divine love?
The answer to this question we seek
in the Gospel. We find it in the won¬
derfully beautiful parable with which our
Lord rebukes Simon the Pharisee for his
complaint of the Master's kindness to
the sinful woman : —
" There was a certain creditor which had
two debtors ; the one owed five hundred pence,
and the other fifty. And when they had noth-
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. Ç
ing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Tell
me, therefore, which of them will love him
most? Simon answered and said, I suppose
that he, to whom he forgave most. And he
said unto him. Thou hast rightly judged. And
he turned to the woman, and said unto Simon,
Seest thou this woman? I entered into thine
house, thou gavest me no water for my feet :
but. she hath washed my feet with tears, and
wiped them with the hairs of her head. Thou
gavest me no kiss : but this woman since the
time I came in hath not ceased to kiss my feet.
My head with oil thou didst not anoint : but this
woman hath anointed my feet with ointment.
Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins, which are
many, are forgiven ; for she loved much : but to
whom little is forgiven the same loveth little." '
This lesson of the Master teaches us
to recognize an important and funda¬
mental connection between love on the
one side, and forgiveness on the other.
Let us try to look into it more deeply.
1 Luke vii. 41, etc.
lO
LOFE AND FORGIVENESS.
II.
LOVE AND THE FORGIVENESS OF SIN.
Love and forgiveness belong together;
so much seems clear from our Lord's
words at the first glance. But how are
we to make this connection real to our
thought.' Who has not at times heard
emphasized with great unction the words :
" Her sins, which are many, are forgiven,
for she loved much."
Taken out of their connection, they
are thereby misused to open widely the
door to righteousness in deeds; and for¬
giveness, instead of being attributed to
the faith which the woman, humbly trust¬
ing, secures as the merciful gift of divine
love, is ascribed to her human love, of
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
II
which it seems, in a certain sense, to be
the reward. And yet the next sentence;
"But to whom little is forgiven, the
same loveth little," indeed the whole
connection demands the very opposite in¬
terpretation of these words. Evidently
our Lord considers the overwhelming
love which shows itself in the whole
behavior of the great sinner, not, in¬
deed, as the cause, but rather as the
proof oi the forgiveness which had come
to her of her many sins; in which we
must admire the adorable tenderness
which leads the Healer of hearts to seize
upon the argument that absolved the
woman, while he gives to the reproof
bestowed upon Simon the form of a
universal lesson. "To whom little is for¬
given the same loveth little." Therefore
the great sinner was not forgiven because
she loved much; on the contrary, for the
reason that so much had been forgiven
12 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
her, does she love, has she been enabled
to love much.
The forgive7iess of sin is therefore the
cause, and love is the effect. Another
similar parable shows that this is our
Lord's meaning (Matthew viii. 25). The
servant who has been released from his
debt of ten thousand pounds finds it at
once demanded of him again when he
sternly insists upon the payment of the
hundred pence which his fellow-servant
owes him. Love appears here not only
as the natural, but the necessary and un¬
failing effect of the forgiveness of sins.
As certain as the fig-tree its fruit, must
forgiveness bring forth love; and as the
unfruitful tree is at last cut down, that
it may not cumber the earth, so is no
forgiveness genuine — that is to say, it
loses its validity — if the fruits of love
do not in their time appear. In their
time! For we must not forget that in
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 13
the experience of the inner life, as well
as in the evidences of Nature, everything
has its time ; that, as the precious parahle
of our Lord in the Gospel of Mark ex¬
plains, the seed after it is put into the
earth brings forth, first the blade, then
the ear, and then the full corn in the
ear. The repentant sinner, therefore,
does not need to wait for the fulness of
love in his heart to be sure of the blessed
forgiveness which he may in and through
faith possess; but he who in the course
of time discerns no love within himself,
if he cannot at once wholly forget and
forgive an injury done him by others,
does not feel himself compelled daily to
struggle and pray for love, and in sin¬
cere repentance to deplore his lack of
it, — such a one has every reason to in¬
quire searchingly whether or not he has
indeed received forgiveness. For al¬
though the merciful love of God is
14
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
always ready to forgive, and ever dis¬
posed to cover even a multitude of sins,
he yet cannot admit every one equally
to a share of forgiveness as he makes
the sun to shine on the just and the
unjust. Forgiveness demands one in¬
dispensable condition, and this is a heart
crushed and humbled, that abandons all
attempt at self-justification, and in full
trust seizes the saving hand of the Re¬
deemer thus offered him. Forgiveness
is near to every one that needs it, but
he alone has the need who knows him¬
self to be a sinner, who discerns his
weakness and helplessness ; and according
to the degree in which he is conscious of
his misery will the measure of forgive¬
ness which he must need be granted.
From this fact we rightly understand
the meaning of the words, " But to whom
little is forgiven, the same loveth little."
They do not mean that God in any way
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 1$
is inclined to forgive one sinner less
than another, or indeed that one is less
guilty than another. No ; God is always
ready, out of the inexhaustible riches of
His mercy, to forgive every one as much
as he can desire ; and the varying burden
of sin between individuals is too slight
to the Searcher of hearts to come into
consideration. Truly if we were only
always ready to allow ourselves to be
forgiven for all our sins, we need never
fear that the measure of love which, cor¬
responding to the measure of forgive¬
ness, must be its result and effect, could
ever fall short of our wishes. But alas !
how inclined we still are, even if the
debtor of five hundred pence, to give but
fifty, because we underestimate our debt;
and this self-deception is enough to ex¬
plain the want of love which we deplore
so bitterly. "To whom little is forgiven,
the same loveth little."
16 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
Why is it that we so often fall into
this fatal mistake, that we deceive our¬
selves so wilfully as to the extent of
our guilt? We find two causes for this
phenomenon, which is as sad as it is
common.
First, the fruit of self-knowledge is
likewise subjected to the law of natural,
gradual development. Especially in fa¬
vorable and sheltered relations, where
there is but little temptation to the
grosser sins, where education and good-
breeding help to keep the heart to a
certain extent free from moral taint, this
knowledge comes only very slowly to full
development. Insight into our own faults
and weaknesses needs the practice of dis¬
cernment in the school of God. Even
sincere young Christians may in the be¬
ginning be confused by self-deception as
to their own hearts. If it is really true
that only the sick need a physician, and
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. I 7
no one knows fully and blessedly what
there is for him in Jesus before recog¬
nizing in him the Redeemer of all sin,
— we must nevertheless not forget that
there are various degrees of disorder,
and he who thinks himself attacked by
some slight illness may equally well turn
to a physician with the one who feels
himself sick unto death. Besides, how
many there are who, though in general
near to him, do not seek in Jesus the
physician and saviour, but the skilled
teacher, and, like Nicodemus, come not
to be made whole by him, but to seek
instruction upon ethical or philosophical
questions,—to whom the solution of the
problems, death, immortality, the eter¬
nal life, seem for the moment far more
important than the question of obtaining
remission of sins.
We should like to illustrate what has
just been said from the inner life-expe-
2
18 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
rience of an earnest woman. Even as
a child she showed a marked interest in
all religious and metaphysical questions,
and a surprising predilection for all that
pertained to these subjects. We had
once an opportunity of observing her
when she was about eight years old, as she
sat lost in meditation over her illustrated
Bible. She had opened the book at the
picture of the Good Shepherd bringing
the lost sheep home on his shoulders,
and was repeating in a low voice the
words, " I say unto you that likewise joy
shall be in heaven over one sinner that
repenteth, more than over the ninety
and nine just persons which need no
repentance."
The little girl sat long pondering; but
suddenly we heard her say, "Really I
should almost like to be a sinner. But,"
she added, " it is n't my fault that 1
belong among the ninety-nine righteous
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 19
ones." And so was expressed the un
conscious self-righteousness of this good
and obedient child, who for the most
part had always satisfied her parents and
teachers. When this childish incident
was recalled after a series of years to the
mature woman, she said with feeling:
"That little scene holds the key to the
whole conduct of my life, both outward
and inward." She had much to tell of
the endless patience which God had be¬
stowed upon her, until the conviction at
last came that she, even she herself, was
the lost sheep. Through her striving
after moral perfection it had not indeed
seemed very difficult to discover some
of her faults, and to obtain help from
God to struggle against them. She
could, however, no more discern the
boundless corruption of her heart than
she could the necessity of the new birth
from above to enlighten her. But the
20
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
urgency with which God everywhere em¬
phasizes this first fundamental law of his
kingdom continually startled her; andas,
if one is unable to perceive any distant
object which a trustworthy friend is
pointing out to him, he does not ques¬
tion the credibility of his friend, but
rather attributes his not seeing it to his
own short-sightedness, so she too be¬
gan, with the holy singer, to pray, —
" Give me eyes myself to see ;
Touch them with thy power divine."
And the Lord granted this prayer. He
led her, fully trusting, over rough ways ;
he allowed her to fall into harsh and
unfriendly surroundings, in which her
natural capacity for love and amiability
did not hold good, but broke down fa¬
tally. Here the thirteenth chapter of
the first epistle to the Corinthians had
to serve as a mirror to her self-conscious¬
ness; and feeling bitterly the loveless-
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
21
ness and selfishness of her own heart,
she knew herself at last to be the lost
sheep. This inward development had to
go on long, very long; but she learned
finally to value even this slowness as a
gift of God. If at one glance she could
have seen the whole extent of her sin¬
fulness, before she had learned at all
times to seek and find refuge in Christ,
she would perhaps have fallen into de¬
spair. Only he who clings for defence
to the ready forgiveness of sin in Christ,
can look undismayed into the abyss of
his own heart.
This brings us to the second thing that
may interrupt and hinder our progress in
self-knowledge. Sometimes our faith in
the all-forgiving love of God in Christ
is not in real earnest. We believe in¬
deed that he is ready to forgive us fifty
but not five hundred pence, and try to
rate our sin accordingly before him and
22 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
to ourselves. The inner connection be¬
tween consciousness of sin and faith in
the forgiveness of sin is more important
than is commonly supposed; only he
who has conviction of the entire ful¬
ness of the latter desires to penetrate to
the very depths of the former. If a fool¬
ish son should anxiously conceal his
debts from his father, he will also care¬
fully avoid even thinking of them, in
order to escape the wearing anxiety as
to how they are to be paid. If, how¬
ever, the father kindly calls his son and
offers to cancel all his debts, will he
not thereby get courage to lay before
his father all his difficulties.' Will he
not take pains to recall every debt, the
smallest as well as the greatest, so that
not a single one shall remain unpaid, to
be reminded of afterwards.' And even
if this is not true of earthly relations,
since unfortunately there are too often
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 23
sons who withhold a part of their debts
from the fatherly forgiveness, whether
it is that their pride hinders them from
making a full confession, or whether
their trust in the fatherly love is not
sufficient, the parallel is all the better
adapted for the application of forgiveness
and consciousness of sin, as every living
Christian will testify from his own ex¬
perience. The deepening of the con¬
sciousness of sin goes hand in hand with
the growth of faith in the forgiveness
of-sin; and so gradually the so-called
"moral" man, whose life has never con¬
flicted with law or custom or propriety,
comes, in the light of the spirit and
word of Christ, to the consciousness that
even his debts amount, not to fifty, but
five hundred pence, and to him not a
little must be forgiven, but much.
But that he to whom much is pardoned
loves more than he to whom little is for-
24 LOy£ AND FORGIVENESS.
given, even the Pharisee finds quite natu¬
ral; without hesitation he answers our
Lord's question to this effect. It dawns
upon the natural, healthy, human intel¬
ligence that the self-evident result of
the pardon of sin must be love, in spite
of experience teaching us that this is
not always proved in daily life. But the
causes of these deviations are so clear in
most cases that the validity of the rule
is not weakened by such exceptions.
Apart from special enormities of in¬
gratitude, we shall find, every time
when forgiveness is not rewarded by
love, that it happened in some loveless,
irritating way, that loving-kindness had
not been the motive-power which touched
the believer to gentleness, that he is either
disposed to boast of his good deeds, or
from indolence, to spare himself weari¬
some perplexity, he refuses to face the
whole extent of his sins, which, more-
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
25
over, seems to him hopeless. That such
cold and repelling methods may arouse
irritation instead of love, is comprehen¬
sible. But he who gives love will al¬
most always receive it; and if that is
true among weak and sinful men, how
much more true of the God who is Love,
of the forgiveness which forever receives
confirmation in Christ's words when he
explains the conversion of the man who
at first would have the delinquent ser¬
vant sold, and then, at his entreaty, re¬
leases him of his debt of ten thousand
pounds. "Then," it is written, "the lord
of that servant was moved with compas¬
sion." And he into whose heart this
"compassion" does not fall like a live
spark to kindle it into a flame of love
is as yet wholly unable to receive for¬
giveness, because he still carries in his
bosom a heart of stone, not yet capable
of any sense of longing for forgiveness.
26 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
The whole depth of mercy and bound¬
less love contained in this "was moved
to compassion," we can indeed only grad¬
ually comprehend. It is difficult for us
to understand, as the apostle says, "the
breadth and the length, the height and
the depth," of this divine mercy and
love. For even as children, it was a
familiar saying to us that God is Love,
that he forgives sins; and it seemed to
us as self-evident as the light of the
sun, as the roaring of the storm, or fall¬
ing of the rain. Even later in life the
words had no surprise for us; habit had
blunted us against the wonder and mys¬
tery of them. And yet, if we are to
taste the full joy of forgiveness, an hour
must come to every one in which this
great love of God is revealed, when be¬
fore this "compassion" he must sink in
prayer upon his knees and cry, —
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
2^
" Mercy has returned to me,
Love of which I am not worth,
That count I as a miracle."
If this divine revelation possesses a man,
if he, in spite of the joyful faith in
which he seizes the proffered forgive¬
ness, can scarcely believe that his sin is
really blotted out and wholly pardoned,
knows that this forgiveness springs from
the unfathomable love of God, who "is
filled with compassion for his servant,"
when, out of the blessed certainty of
reconciliation with him, his soul is filled
with peace, then must love bloom natu¬
rally in his heart, which, in grateful,
adoring surrender to God, finds its high¬
est blessedness.
And yet even this love — and we may
take this for our comfort — is an organic
growth, which develops slowly and grad¬
ually out of an invisible germ. Not
alone does the natural man come as a
28 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
helpless infant into the world, but he
too who is born from above must pass
through all stages of development, from
weak infancy to manhood. To reach in
fulness and warmth the point expressed
by the Psalmist in the words "Whom
have I in heaven but thee.' and there is
none upon earth that I desire beside
thee," may indeed demand a lifetime.
Very few, in fact, even among ripe
Christians, can say these words with a sin¬
cere heart. Shall we therefore despair?
Far from it. Mourn we must that our
love remains so far short of this stand¬
ard. Again and again will this knowl¬
edge fill us with a fresh consciousness
of sin that brings us to the feet of Jesus
to learn there to seek forgiveness, and
in forgiveness love ; but we are not
therefore to lose courage. So long as
from the depths of our hearts we can
say, "When thy face does not shine,
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 29
nothing that all heaven and earth can
offer will satisfy me. When I possess
not thy love, there is no enduring bless¬
ing,"— so long as we feel thus, we may
be certain that our love is in the way of
right development, that He who has be¬
gun the good work will in His time fulfil
it, and that our weak love must some
day grow strong and deep enough to let
us say, "Whom have I in heaven but
thee ? and there is none upon earth that
I desire beside thee."
30 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
III.
THE LOVE OF GOD AND THE LOVE
OF OUR NEIGHBOR.
We have just seen how the love of
God grows out of the forgiveness of
sin. It remains now for us to explain
to ourselves in what way the love of
our neighbor, too, "the greatest thing
in the world," as Henry Drummond calls
it, springs from the same root.
The inward connection between the
love of God and brotherly love is
referred to on almost every page of
the New Testament. Everywhere, in the
words of our Lord, as well as in the
teachings of his apostles, the one with¬
out the other is held to be an impos¬
sibility, — not in the sense, let it be
LOyE AND FORGiyENESS. 31
understood, that fcrotherly love is the
source from which flows the divine, but
rather that the two stand in the same
inseparable union as heat with fire, light
with the sun. Without heat, no fire;
without light, no sun; without brotherly
love, no divine love. That is so certain
that the former may serve as a gauge
by which to measure the latter, as the
Apostle John declares in terrible ear¬
nest when he writes: "If any man says
he loves God and hates his brother, the
same is a liar."
Here again we say, for our comfort,
that brotherly love is subject to the
same law of gradual development; that
the new creature, gradually growing, is
just here to have its hardest fight with
the old nature; that selfishness presents
the strongest obstacle to brotherly love;
and the daily self-denial and taking up
of the cross which Jesus demanded of
32 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
his followers is nowhere so hard as in
this direction. But any one who, after
years of so-called Christian living, still
passes his neighbor by in coldness and
indifference must, if he is honest with
himself, acknowledge that he cannot take
it ill if the genuineness of his Christian
faith is to be doubted, and also ask him¬
self whether he has really been born of
the Spirit,whether the inward experiences
of which he boasted were not wholly or
partly based on self-delusion. He who
loves God must also, at least to some
degree, love his neighbor, — it cannot
be otherwise; for the love of God, if it
is genuine, and not based upon emo¬
tional self-deception, must rouse into
activity three strong motives for broth¬
erly love. Let us exarhine these in
their order.
Perfect love "casteth out fear;" but
there is a kind of fear which therein
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 33
finds its source, — namely, the holy
dread of any loosening of the bond, of
doing anything to disturb that inward
oneness which constitutes the essence
of love. Now, he who fulfilled the law,
and bore our sins in his body on the
cross, has left the explicit command that
his followers should " love one another, ,
as he loved them." He comes back to
it over and over again; in parables, as
well as in his direct teaching, he pro¬
claims anew the indispensableness of
brotherly love. And his apostles follow
his example most faithfully. Who can
count all the passages in which this
subject is treated, from the Sermon on
the Mount to Christ's words after the
washing of his feet, and the last dis¬
course before his death ; from the exhor¬
tations in the epistle to the Romans to
that of John? In view of such unequivo¬
cal expressions, it is impossible to con-
3
34
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
ceive that one can enjoy undisturbed
communion with Christ while living in
disobedience to his command, with the
heart in full possession of selfishness.
All uncharitableness lies like a cloud
between us and the face of the Lord,
and does not allow us the full joy of
communion with Him again until bitter
tears of repentance have been shed.
Any one who knows the inner life can
out of his own experience recall many
proofs of how every unkind word, every
uncharitable dealing, every resentment
of an injury, came as a disturbing ele¬
ment between him and God. But every
one whose heart's desire is expressed in
the words, " Whom have I in heaven but
thee ? and there is none upon earth that
I desire besides thee," will submit to
any sacrifice rather than draw upon him¬
self the pain of separation from God.
He who is accustomed to breathe pure
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 35
air feels himself choked and uncom¬
fortable in a room filled with smoke; he
who stands in loving relations with God
feels unable to exist if His support is
withdrawn from him. The longing to
enjoy undisturbed oneness with God, the
fear that the light of His countenance
may be hidden, is then for the Christian
a mighty spur in the struggle against
uncharitableness. For oneness, full,
blessed oneness, can only be when there
is but one mind. Every "division" re¬
moves it, temporarily, at least. We
must be at one with God if our rela¬
tion to him is to remain undisturbed.
But He is Love, and we alone live ac¬
ceptably to Him so far as we live in
love. The longer and more faithfully
we strive to fulfil His commands, how¬
ever, the more our conscience becomes
sensitive and exacting. It may seem to
us at first quite sufficient to follow the
36 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
old rule, " Love thy neighbor as thy¬
self ; " but more and more we shall feel
compelled to take our Lord's words in
earnest, "All things whatsoever ye
would that men should do to you, do
ye even so to them," — so greatly do
our self-love and self-seeking offer re¬
sistance to this precept, even when we
apply it to persons with whom God has
placed us in close relations. As to the ap¬
plication of this principle, what is more
suited to bring us in all humility face
to face with the fact that we owe again
and again the five hundred pence, than
our conduct in a single day? The Chris¬
tian life is indeed not something ready
finished, granted once for all through
the new birth. The narrow gate of sal¬
vation and repentance does not stand
alone at the entrance of the way, and
forgiveness and mercy are not attained
at once forever. Just as a man must
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 37
daily eat and daily hunger again, so
too must the Christian in daily repent¬
ance implore forgiveness for his daily
sins and for the indwelling of the Holy
Spirit, which alone makes the attain¬
ment of holiness possible. In this un¬
folding follow in constant rotation the
consciousness of sin, its forgiveness, one¬
ness with God, and striving for holiness,
which through new achievement leads
to new sensitiveness to sin. Thus only
can the Christian be armed against this
deadliest enemy, spiritual pride, which
lulls him into security and mortally im¬
perils his life. All who with sincere
hearts are struggling with sin, and yet
are ready to despair because their prog¬
ress seems to them scarcely percepti¬
ble, may have this consolation ; let these
words strengthen you: "My grace is
suihcient for thee; for my strength is
made perfect in weakness;" made per-
38 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
feet too, to strengthen brotherly love,
until it has gained full mastery over
selfishness.
Next in importance to the dread of
seeing our union with God interrupted
and disturbed, comes, as a second motive
to brotherly love, the wish to live ac¬
ceptably to Him who has bestowed upon
us all that we have. In the tempta¬
tions to uncharitableness and unkind-
ness which assail us on all sides, this
desire may serve as a very real protec¬
tion. "Do it for the love of God;"
"Bear it for Him;" "Be silent for love
of Him,"—from such words may come
new strength to secure the half-won bat¬
tle. The weary labor will be hallowed
and sweetened if undertaken as in the
service of the Lord's vineyard, and
much that we cannot willingly do for
our neighbor becomes possible if we
can say to ourselves that we do it for
LOr£ AND FORGIVENESS. 39
our Saviour, — for him who for us can¬
celled the great debt of "ten thousand
pounds." Unjust demands are often
made of the Christian, which, however,
he must not avoid if he follows the apos¬
tle's command, "as much as in him lies,
to live peaceably with all men." The
more perfected a man's natural sense of
right is, however, the less he is himself
inclined to make unreasonable demands
of others; and so much the harder is it
for him in such cases to give up and com¬
ply himself. To walk two miles when
he is only obliged to walk one is never
the natural human way. Perhaps, in¬
deed, he would voluntarily go three ; but
to be forced to appears hard, almost un¬
bearable to him. Only when the Chris¬
tian, behind the voice that "requires,"
can discern God ; when out of imperative
human words he can hear the Saviour's
gentle "Do it for my sake," and all
40
LOyE AND FORGIVENESS.
bitterness thereby is driven from his
heart, — is he able to practise this most
difficult kind of self-denial. For a sin¬
cere Christian to have to do at all with
those who are not earnest followers of
Christ, and are therefore not bending
all their energies to live according to
the law of love, is not easy. "The best
cannot live in peace, if it does not
please his evil neighbor," says the
poet. Often enough must the Christian
experience the truth of this saying, and
he suffers doubly through such hostility
because in a certain way, it seems as if
he were bound hand and foot, and al¬
most at the mercy of his opponent.
The old weapons which the natural man
might have used are now taken from
him. Should he return unkindness and
insult in like coin, he would disturb
his relations with God, who through
his Son has said, "Bless them that
LOy£ AND FORGIVENESS.
41
curse you; do good to them that hate
you; and pray for them which despite-
fully use you and persecute you." Hard,
very hard often, is this struggle against
the "self," and only too often does the
natural man get the victory over the
new creature, and hurry him into pas¬
sionate outbreaks, for which he must
afterwards in repentance and sorrow
seek forgiveness, before the light of
God's countenance can shine for him
again. But if he can remember at the
right time the infinite bounty of his
Redeemer; if he can hear the inward
call, "Bear it, be silent for the love of
God," — then out of the love which fills
his heart for him who has forgiven him
all, will flow the strength to be silent
and endure. But silence and endurance
help very much to soften such discords;
even if they cannot heal the wound, they
can prevent its becoming wider, and if
42 LOyE AND FORGIVENESS.
the relation between two persons bound
to each other does not become worse as
time goes on, it must naturally grow
better. And so the hard task of return¬
ing indifference and hostility with love
grows easier and easier, and that, too,
without considering that God has a thou¬
sand ways and means of showing justice
in his good time to his children, if they
do not seek either appreciation or ven¬
geance, and of convincing those who hated
and injured them of their injustice.
And still a third, and not less effectual
motive for brotherly love is awakened
through love to God. It is in the sense
of oneness with him that there comes
to us a true knowledge of men, by which
we learn to understand their individu¬
ality, their weaknesses and good quali¬
ties. One may be a great philosopher,
and have a profound knowledge of human
nature, and be able to analyze accurately
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
43
all the emotions of the heart, and yet, in
a special case, when true personal charac¬
ter is at stake, make a wholly erroneous
judgment. A true objectivity is pos¬
sible only when self-love is accustomed
to retire, when man is not judged as to
his behavior in relation to one's own
personal " self. " Riickert says truly, —
" As from the central fire to earth the sunbeams dart,
So falls a ray from God in every creature's heart ;
And by this spark it is that in his bosom glows,
His lineage from God, His child, the creature knows.
From creature out to creature there shines no heav¬
enly ray.
But broken, lurid gleams, confusing where they play ;
Think not thou canst by such thy fellow recognize.
A bitter darkness still shall veil him from thine eyes.
Nay, mount thou up to God, and gazing thence below.
Along a ray not thine, thy brother shalt thou know ;
For only so canst thou the creature see aright.
United laith thyself, within the Source of Light."
Thus the poet represents our meaning
exactly. For the reason that the mo¬
tives of our neighbor do not lie as
44
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
openly before us as our own, we attrib¬
ute to him as serious faults things for
which in ourselves we should discover
a thousand mitigating circumstances.
The reason for this injustice in most
cases lies neither in intention nor in
ill-will; the fact is that we are not able
to see what is passing in the inmost
depths of his heart which would explain
and excuse his behavior. For example,
it would be hard for us at an outburst
of anger in our fellow-creature to put it
to the account of tired nerves, mental
exhaustion, or bodily illness, as clearly
as we like to for ourselves when we
fall a prey to the temptation to anger.
Perhaps we succeed to a certain extent
when we are present at such an outbreak
as impartial witnesses; but if we our¬
selves are the victim upon which it vents
itself, then all understanding or consid¬
eration of bodily or spiritual conditions
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
45
ceases, and for him who has violated the
majesty of our "self" almost no reproach
is severe enough.
But near to God and in communion
with Christ we gradually learn to look
upon men as He, the All-Merciful did.
The servant to whose consciousness it
is a living fact that his own debt of a
thousand pounds has been cancelled can¬
not possibly feel ready to destroy his
fellow-servant because he owes him a
hundred pence. He remembers too
clearly how he himself fell into debt;
he knows too well in what fashion we
are made, and the humbling conscious¬
ness that even he, though supported and
upheld by strength from above, is always
falling again and again into sin, will
make the faults of one who has not yet
fully entered upon discipleship, and for
whom the "They know not what they
do" may again be used, seem far more
40 LOVE AND FORGIVENESS.
excusable. The Christian who has him¬
self experienced this forgiving love can
never forget that God "had compassion"
on him ; that he, the Holy One, beheld
his sin undismayed; that he, the Pure
One, did not shrink from the impurity
of his heart. And he in whom this
great change of conversion has taken
place knows well that no one is so bad,
so perverted, so godless that he cannot
some time be restored. He learns to
discern in every human being the dear
child of his Heavenly Father, and com¬
passion for the misery and need of his
brother takes possession of his heart.
He pities his fellow-man, and instead of
lifting his hand against him in anger and
violence, the desire rises to help him ; for
compassion is the outer court which
leads directly into the Temple of Love.
And even if, so long as we wander on
earth, our love remains always imper-
LOVE AND FORGIVENESS. 47
feet and fragmentary, it is nevertheless
a guiding-star by which all our living
and doing are regulated. It no longer
comes to us as an outside command to
live in loving obedience towards God;
the fear of losing our union with him
moves us; through the working of the
Holy Spirit upon our hearts they gradu¬
ally attain a natural compelling impulse,
and now for the first time we recognize
how this, "the greatest thing in the
world," lightens and sweetens the bur¬
den of life.
But we who are all striving for this
highest good, to the prayer of the young
man, "Lord, increase our faith," must
add, "and give us love." We all who
value the promise of Jesus, "Ask, and
it shall be given unto you," must not
forget that only out of the forgiveness
that we have received grows directly the
love to God, and indirectly, love to man ;
48 LOyE AND FORGIVENESS.
that the summum bonum, "the greatest
thing in the world," stands in deep and
fundamental union with the conscious¬
ness of our sins. He only who sincerely
mourns over himself, and has it con¬
stantly in mind what an enormous bur¬
den has been removed from him, — only
such a heart has the necessary quality
while "resting in Jesus," through the
magnetic power of his love, to be trans¬
formed itself into a magnet of love ; and
upon such alone can the process of in¬
duction be fulfilled upon which Henry
Drummond discourses, for he only "to
whom much is forgiven loves much."
THE END.
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