SUNDAY READING.

Taranaki Daily News, 11 December 1915, Page 9 (Supplement)

SUNDAY READING.

(A Sermon preached toy the Rev. A. 11. Colvile, M.A., at St. Mary's Church 011 Sunday, December 5.) "Thou, Lord, art merciful, for Thou rewardest every man according to his works."—Psalm 62, 12. I want to say one word of preface to this evening's sermon. There is always this danger in preaching, that one's hearers should extract from the sermon just that thought which suits them, take it home with them, administer it to themselves as a sop to their consciences, and altogether disregard everything in that same sermon which might hit them hard and make them uncomfortable about their lives. Some time ago I preached, a sermon for All Souls' .Day from the words, "Behold all souls are Mine," in which 1 emphasised God's responsibility for every soul born into this world, and for every soul that leaves this world. Now 1 have been given to understand that there were some who said to themselves, "If God is responsible for me, and if one day I shall l>e restored and live with Him for ever, what does it matter how I live here on earth or what my life is like? ■May 1 not go on piling up sin upon sin, doing just what 1 want to do, knowing that it will all come right in the end, not worrying myself, as there will be no such thing as future punishment;" There is, I say, always a danger that whenever the preacher dwells on the eternal love of God for man, there should be those who interpret that love as mere indulgence and leave out that absolutely necessary and inevitable process of pain and discipline before love can come to its own and win its filial victory. Tn the same sermon to which I have referred I spoke of this discipline (though it is true that I did not draw lurid pictures of the punishi-'.'iit of sinners), and to-night I wish to speak of it again, aye, and to emphasise it, lest calling to mind God's responsibility we fail to remember our own: lest, rejoicing in the knowledge of God's love we forget that that love is a consuming fire; lest while we believe in God's never-failing mercy we lose sight of the Advent thought of inevitable judgment by which a merciful Lord "rewards every man according to his work."

Let us first lay fast hold of the knowledge that it is impossible to escape from £he love of God. That love is tremendous, intense, unrelenting; the most desperate and determined sinner cannot evade it. He thinks he doesn't want it. He runs away from it far into the wilderness. He piles up barriers against jt. He rejects it over and over again. He goes down to the hell lie has made for himself, to the hell for which lie Sias fitted himself, and there is the love of God pursuing. It is this very unrelenting quality in God's love that makes us fear Him, that warns us of judgment and future punishment. If God's love were hut sentimental pity, then indeed the sinner might plume himself oil an easy forgiveness and restoration in the future; then indeed he might say to himself, "What does it matter? It will come all right in the end." Again, if God's love were strong up to a point, and then grew weary and let go its hold and was content !o accept failure, the sinner might think, ''Well, by now I have forfeited every chance and lost every hope; what does it matter now what becomes of mc!'' But God's love, revealed to us in Christ, is strong, unwearied, persisteit, and the end and aim of that love is not to make us comfortable by lettiug us off our punishment, by taking away from u; the consequences of what we have done, but to bring us to Himself, and so cleanse and purify and strengthen our characters that ultimately we shall become fit to fulfil our destiny and live with Him for ever. And such love will shrink from nothing, from no pain, from no discipline, that its end may he accomplished. Let no man, then, think to himself, "It doesn't matter how I live, because God is merciful and will in the end restore me." What would it profit the sinner to "he restored," to live with God for ever, if the sin he had loved and cherished remained in his lieari: Xo; God is, merciful with a truer and deeper mercy than that. Tie "rewards every mail according to his works," which is only another way of saying, "Whatsoever a man sows that shall lie also reap." And that is mercy. Haven't we often found it so in this world? God doesn't let us off now, and He will not let us off hereafter, because such "letting off" would not be the truest mercy. It woUld leave us still in the very dust of our sin, no more fit for God's presence than before we were forgiven. So it often happens here and now that a man suffers the consequences of what he has done. Every day he is judged; every day lie is punished. That act of sin, committed, it may he, long ago, has brought his punishment upon him. He wishes with nil his heart that lie had never made that mistake or committed that folly, that act of passion that lias crippled his life, but as far as punishment is concerned no amount of wishing will do any good. The thing is done, and punishment is inevitable. In the solemn words of the gospel it is "too late." "The door is shut" 011 the full fresh glory of life that might have been his. He long's to lie able to "start afresh," but that is just what he cannot do, what he is not allowed to do. His fellows have judged him and go on judging him; the tongues of men and women mutter against him; the stealthy whisper pursues him; like Cain, he cries out in his heart that the "punishment is greater than he can bear," that it is altogether too much, but for all his cries the stream of consequences still flows 011 unchecked. And there is the love of God working 011 his life; there is the merciful discipline of good rewarding him "according to his works," that he may at last have the horrible poison of sin forced out of his system and be made whole. That is the reason for punishment. its object is at once to cleanse the sinner from his sin and to warn others.

But true punishmeent is.never vindictive. God does not punish a man as perhaps a father may punish a son, because he is angry at his laws being disobeyed and his will resisted. If God were vindictive, if God's love were anything but what it is, absolutely unwearying, then we might perhaps believe in the horrors of unending physical torture, though surely the goodness produced by fear of such punishment would bo of a very inferior sort. But God's punishments, terrible as they are, are remedial, going to the very root of the mischief, and for that very reason no one ean escape tliem. The fool who says in his heart, "It doesn't matter how I live because God will not punish nie" is akin to the fool wjio says in his heavfr, "There is 110 God at all." If ypu knew, e.g., that if yeu were careless about your health, and~ deliberately disobeyed certain physical laws the consequences would be pain, sickness, disease, and nnd painful i 1 Inoan. nprh»m "• ,

rible agonizing operation, you would not say to yourself, "ft doesn't matter how 1 live now, or what penalty I incur, because in the end I shall be, cured." You would not pile up all those miseries for yourself and face the handicap of a long, crippled, stunted life with indifference when a man who has not worked out his own salvation here on earth, who has nut responded to the efforts of the Good Samaritan, the God working within him, working through discipline, will have to submit to that remedial disciplne hereafter.

Look at the picture our Lord has drawn for us in the parable of Dives and Lazarus. There is the sinner who left this world impenitent, indifferent, wrapped up in his own egotism, now, as it were, stretched on the operating table; no anaesthetic is given him; "son remember," the words are beaten into his brain, "remember all your past selfishness and indifference and the luxurious materialism in which you hid yourself from the love of God. Remember the 'good time' you enjoyed so callously at the expense of others. Now the fires of God' 3 love are, in pain and anguish, cleansing you and purifying your life." Ah! It was a terrible operation, but it was succeeding. Wee, the selfish individualist is beginning to think of others. "0 send and warn my brethren," he cries, "lest they also come into this place of torment." And who could think that God by His terrible, but merciful discipline could thus produce an amendment in character only to crush it out again in endless, hopeless pain. No, God does indeed "reward every man according to his work"; the law that binds punishment to sin spares none, and for that very reason the purified sinner cries out from his heart., "Thou, Lord, art merciful." Out of the cleansing lire through which he has passed, has come a clean vision, a deep penitence, a desire. for God Slid for holiness that he could not feel while selfishness, sensuality, passion, greed, indifference were lying like a dead weight upon his soul. "Depart from me" are the stern words of judgment that the impenitent sinner hears; "depart from me into everlasting fire." They are absolutely natural words. There is nothing arbitrary about them. We could expect nothing else. The man is indeed unfit for the presence of Christ. He would not be able to dwell with goodness. He would not want to. He departs into the cleansing fire of God's love that his sin may be burnt away. But with his departure God's responsibility does not end. When the criminal leaves the dock and goes to take his punishment the responsibility of society, whose mouthpiece the magistrate is, does not end. There is something beyond judgment, and that is restoration, and so our human justice, fften fallible, often one-sided, is now beginning to realize. And shall God's justice, strong and righteous and unerring, slop short at condemnation and be content to accept failure, when man's strives still to get beyond, strives still for ultimate success? I cannot believe it. In England the poor people speak of those who have gone to prison as being "in trouble" simply. 'There is a sense in which that is true of all who suffer the consequences of sin, in gaol or out of it, in this life or the next. They are "in trouble," and God is with them there, working with infinite patience and infinite love, until His justice shall have accomplished that which He has willed, the salvation of all His children, until the purified sinner can say out. of the depths of his heart, "ft is good for me that I have been in trouble that I might learn Thy commandments" and "Thou, Lord, art merciful, for Thou hast rewarded me according to my work."