The Wealth of Life.

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THE WEALTH OF LIFE. W. L. WATKI SO

My cup runneth over. PSALM xxiii. 5. THE overflowing idea is everywhere. I. Our cup of natural blessing is not simply sufficing, but redundant. We see this : In the beauty of creation as opposed to mere utility. The sad philosopher of antiquity confessed : { He hath made everything beautiful in His time ; and the poet of to-day rejoices : All things have more than barren use. Some modern cynics have roundly abused nature and tried hard to show the seamy side of the rainbow, but the loveliness and grandeur of things are too much for them, and the poet s vocation is not yet gone. Our natural belief also in the spirituality and transcendence of the beautiful and sublime is too profound to be up rooted by the utilitarian, however ingeniously he may argue on the material and physiological. Everywhere we see nature passing beyond utility into that delightful something we call beauty, glory, grandeur. Sounds harmonize into music ; colours glow until the round world seems a broad, un was ting iris ; cries blend into songs ; the earth breaks into blossoms ; the sky "kindles

150 THE WEALTH OF LIFE. into stars. However the utilitarian may urge his sordid

story, we cannot look at the superb dome of manycoloured glass above us, or ponder the vast panorama of earth and sea, full of pictures, poems, and sym phonies which human art at best only darkly mirrors, without feeling that life inherits riches far beyond all material uses. The gorgeous garniture of the universe at which the mere physicist stumbles, and which gener ations of metaphysicians fail to explain, is simply the overflow of our royal cup. In the abundance of creation as opposed to mere sufficiency. i Thou preparest a table before me. And how richly is that table furnished ! We have a school of political economists tormented by the dread of population outstripping the means of subsistence, and which is ever warning society against the awful peril. What confusions of heart arid understanding do all these ominous vaticinations betray, seeing we dwell in a world so rich and elastic ! At one period of his life John S. Mill was distressed by the appre hension of the exhaustibility of musical combinations, but he came to see that the possibilities of original harmony are practically infinite. It would be a bles sing if that school of economists with which Mill is identified could be brought to perceive that the possibilities of the world on every side are practi cally infinite. It is true that many suffer sad lack, but this is the consequence of human vice and folly, improvidence and inisgovernment, not of God s pro-

THE WEALTH OF LIFE. 157 visions or arrangements. Let man be wise and

good, and, however thronged the habitable part of the earth, there shall be no complaining. The legend tells us that in olden times the ear of wheat extended the whole length of the straw, and it was through the sin of man that the ears of corn spring as as we see them now. Truly this legend reflects the truth of all times, that the exuberance of God has been marred by the folly of man. But if reason, virtue and gratitude should resume their sway throughout the earth, will not the wheat once more grow all down the straw ? Or to drop the imagery, has not God many margins yet left for meeting the needs of every living tiling ? ay, in presence of the suggestions of modern science, would it not be more nearly correct still to say that hitherto God s margins only have been touched, and the vast storehouses of nature with their manifold and bursting treasures are reserved for the Millennium s golden years ? i The earth is full of His riches ; riches for the swarming millions richly to enjoy. II. Let us remember the superabundance of our cup of social blessing. God setteth the solitary in fami lies. He has constituted society that the joy of life might be full. See the precious clusters which through this gracious arrangement are pressed into our cup ! First, perhaps, to strike the eye amongst the clusters of our Canaan is Home the father s reason made silken by affection ; the mother s voice sweeter than any music ; the kindly strength of the brother ; the fond-

158 THE WEALTH OF LIFE. ness of the sister ; the comeliness and sparkle of little

children. Friendship is a kindred cluster englobing rich wine. Another fruition is Philanthropy, delicious as a fruit of Paradise plucked from some branch runningover the wall. Then the eye longs to drink as well as the lip, and the ear to drink as well as the eye, so Art displays creations refreshing- as the vineyard s purple wealth ; the artist with marble and canvas unsealing fountains of beauty, the musician with pipe and string pouring streams of melody. Science shows the earth a great emerald cup whose fulness flashes over the jewelled lip. Literature is a polished staff bearing grapes beyond those of Eshcol. Commerce is a whole vine in itself, and we gaze at its embarrassing lavishment with amazed delight. * Fir trees, cedars and oaks ; silver, iron, tin, lead, and vessels of brass ; horns of ivory and ebony ; wheat, honey, oil, and balm ; horses and horsemen, lambs, rams, and goats ; wine and whitewool ; chests of rich apparel, bound with cords ; emeralds, purple and broidered work, and fine linen, coral and agate ; cassia and calamus, with chief of all spices, and with all precious stones and gold. By our ships we are replenished and made very glorious in the midst of the seas. Patriotism is a first-rate grape whose generous blood gives to the spirit that unselfish glow which surpasses all sensual pleasure ; and the best wine runs last in that senti ment of Humanity which gives the crowning joy to the festival of life.

THE WEALTH OF LIFE. 159 So full is the air of lamentations, that we might well conclude the world a wilderness. The greatest struggle

is for bread. Yet the opulence of the world is undeni able. The grass grows on the mountains ; the valleys sing with corn ; the flocks sprinkle the pastures ; the cattle are upon a thousand hills. The rain, the dews, the sunlight, and a thousand hidden forces make the earth to bring forth a hundredfold. How otherwise can this spectacle of nature s opulence and human stint be explained than on the ground of our ignorance, folly, and sin ? We starve in the midst of plenty ; or, in other words,- are subjects of an absorbing anxiety for the necessaries of life in a world surcharged with riches, because our vanity and lust prevent us realizing what we see and desire. There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is common among men : a man to whom God hath given riches, wealth and honour, so that he wanteth nothing for his soul of all that he desireth, yet God giveth him not power to eat thereof. To a large extent this is the picture of the race. The over-flowing cup is knocked over in our carelessness or greediness, and, instead of being regaled by the rich feast Heaven spreads on summer s embroidered cloth, in folly and passion we doom ourselves to cat crumbs which fall from the table. Surely, when the nations return to wisdom and virtuo they shall no more be an hungered, but find the world their Father s house, with bread enough and to spare. And in those days, too, it shall no more be felt that the individual is im-

ICO THE WEALTH OF LIFE. poverished by society. ow we too often feel that the multitude is the enemy of the individual ; that the increase of the number makes the struggle all the more

bitter for each member. But, really, society is the instrument of God for multiplying the world s riches and joy, and in the day when the human brotherhood shall dwell together in knowledge and love each shall serve all, and all each, until in the sublime reciprocity the land overflows with milk and honey. III. The munificence of God is revealed to the uttermost in the cup of spiritual blessing. The cup of salvation runs over. It was not the study of God just to save us, but to save us fully, overflo \vingly. We see this: 1. In the pardoning of sin. God does not forgive sin with measure and constraint, but graciously multiplies pardons. The overflowing cup is the sign of a grand welcome, of a cordial friendship, of a most hearty love. The Roman Catholic Church distinguishes between the turpitude of sins, and on this special appraisement constructs a scale of fees for the absolu tion of various classes and degrees of transgressors. The Word of God contains no such scale. The whole idea is abhorrent to the genius of the ew Testament. The forgiveness of God is not official, arithmetical, hesitating, but free and full beyond all compare. i He will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the

THE WEALTH OF LIFE. 161 earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. God s thoughts

and ways are ever beyond our own, as the sky is beyond the dust, but the special teaching of this famous passage is, that God s pardoning love sin gularly and immeasurably transcends our own. For giveness is a divine art in which poor human nature is a sorry blunderer. Then came Peter to Him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him ? till seven times ? Here our grudging spirit finds honest expression ; here we see where the arithmetical notion of forgiveness comes from. How would this grace stopping at ( seven times have dealt with sins as the sand of the sea for multitude ? But God s love stands in immediate and immense contrast to the churlishness of man ; as the starry heavens overtop the hills, so God s pardoning love leaves our soaring thoughts behind. Beyond us in all things and thoughts, Heaven is specially beyond us in the vastness and height of its mercy. And the full illustration of this is the Gospel. If forgiveness is a divine art, Go 1 in Christ is the supreme Artist, and forgiveness through His blood is His everlasting masterpiece. In His re deeming work Christ found room within the law ot righteousness for the largest mercy, and it is the standing wonder of heaven and earth that the Holy One of Israel can absolve the chief of sinners. But millions of transgressors poor He has freely and fully 11

162 THE WEALTH OF LIFE. forgiven, and left them rejoicing in the sweet con

sciousness which no words speak. The returning prodigal could cherish no suspicion of his father s clemency ; the ring, the robe, the feast, the minstrelsy told of an ample pardon and full reconciliation. And when God pardons our sin, the joy and glory of our soul leaves no room to ask, is that presumptuous sin forgiven ? that secret sin ? that crimson sin ? that sin of my youth ? that sin of my hoary years ? So freely, so royally does God forgive, that only the strangest unbelief of the soul can cast a doubt on such compassion. t We receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness. 2. In the sanctification of the soul. We are not merely saved by Christ from ruin, but into a surpass ing perfection of life. The Psalmist prayed : Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean : wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. What is whiter than snow ? We have white clouds, flowers, foam, shells ; but in the whole realm of nature know nothing whiter than snow. Are we then to dismiss the Psalmist s aspiration as so much oriental rhetoric ? The highest poetry contains the deepest truth, and we must seek lovingly for great meanings in expressions which are really a Divine rhetoric. Is not the truth here, that grace gives our spirit a perfection beyond all perfec tion found in nature ? Science declares that in things most perfect there is some imperfection, that there is an ideal perfection which nature rarely or never reaches

THE WEALTH OF LIFE. 163 that the most exquisite organs lack theoretical har

mony and finish. Rude matter does not attain all the delicacy of the Divine thought, and the naturalist with the Psalmist complains : I have seen an end of all perfection. But the human spirit aspires to a truthfulness, purity and beauty beyond that of the physical universe, it pants to be whiter than snow ; and this subliinest aspiration of our being is destined to attainment in Jesus Christ. In Him we find a perfection beyond the utmost finish of material things, a glory beyond that of the crowning organisations of the material sphere. Christ also loved the Church, and gave Himself for it ; that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but that it should be holy and without blemish. These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no guile ; for they are without fault before the throne of God. Here, at least, the actual reaches the ideal. How full and rich the Almighty grace ! Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. 3. Our last illustration of the boundless love is the provision for the soul s satisfaction in Christ Jesus. History tells that an ancient king granted pardon to some criminals under sentence of death, but when these discharged malefactors applied for relief at the palace gates the king refused them, protesting : ( I

164 THE WEALTH OF LIFE. granted you life, but did not promise you bread. This

is not the theory of the Gospel ; Christ not only saves from destruction, but opens to the soul sources of rich strengthening and endless satisfaction. ( In this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined. This prediction is grandly accomplished in Him in Whom dwelleth all the fulness of the God head bodily. The Gospel of Christ is not a scheme meeting a certain dreadful exigency and then of no further significance ; it is the fullest revelation of the Divine truth and love and holiness on which the spirits of the just shall feed and feast for ever. And here the saints feel how the riches of grace go beyond their largest thought and desire. Their joy is i un speakable and full of glory ; their peace i passeth understanding ; they asked liie and He gave it them, even length of days for ever and ever. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. The cup of salvation overflows. It overflows language. What is the mean ing of those rapt utterances which are so frequently heard in assemblies of the saints where liberty of utterance is allowed? Glory , Hallelujah, and kindred expressions heard in the Church of God carry no well-bounded and definite meaning, but are vague ecstatic ascriptions giving voice to the infinity of the

THE WEALTH OF LIFE. 165 s( ul s joy when language fails ; they are the golden splashes of an overflowing cup, the blessedness of life

overbrimming the limitations of speech. It overflows thought. The intellect cannot measure or define the greatness of God s love or the preciousness of His gifts. It passeth knowledge. It overflows the heart. The saint sometimes cries with Fletcher : Lord, stay Thine hand, or the vessel will break. As in certain parts of Australia the abundance of flowers fills the air with sweetness until it becomes painful to the lenses, so does the saint sometimes so vividly realise the grand all-encompassing love of God that the soul is overwhelmed with the mingled pain and bliss, and only finds vent in adoring tears. Joy through our swimming eyes doth break, And mean the thanks we cannot speak. The overflowing cup indicates our real greatness. Some might hastily conclude it was rather a sign of our shallowness or limitation, and in a sense it is such a sign, but far more truly does it indicate the infinity which cleaves to us. The cup of the beast is full exactly full its enjoyments strictly limited by its organization, and no sense of the beyond. At all points, on the contrary, we have the sense of bound lessness. The earth is the cornucopia of God, whose streaming treasures go so far beyond craving needs as to create in us the poetic sentiment, which is the senti ment of infinity. The social economy leading on to

166 THE WEALTH OF LIFE. the confederation of the world and the realization of the precious products of all climes, multiplies our

resources until appetite is satiated and imagination exults in riches the senses cannot overtake. And the copious excellence of the truth and grace of God in Christ spreads a new and wider horizon to call forth endless wonder and gratitude. We belong to the unbounded ; we are the heirs of infinity and eternity. How foolish are we then to seek to live away from God, to seek felicity in our own devices ! And here is the secret of the misery of thousands. These never feel the wealth of life, the profuseness of material for enjoyment, the illimitable joy ; they have only the sense of depletion, exigency and emptiness. They live without God ; use nature without God, are members of society without God, and reject God in Christ. The cup of such is neither full nor sweet. Let God fill the cup of life and it forthwith overflows. All things must be mediums for seeing Him, receiv ing Him, serving Him ; then is fulness of joy and pleasures for evermore. We must not live in the temporal, but look through the temporal to the unseen and eternal, so life becomes large and profound, sublime and satisfying. We must bring infinity into life the infinite love and law and promise. The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance, and of my cup. In all tilings are we to prove His will, taste His love, work to His ends, rest in His promise and faithfulness. All things are to be cups, all persons cupbearers ; but

THE WEALTH OF LIFE. 167 the Heavenly presence and blessing is to be the wine of God cheering the heart evermore. Then, when the

Lord is the portion of our cup, when the thought of eternity enriches life, when an infinite hope and peace fill the spirit, wherever we may be and whatever our lot, we shall be able to continue with the Psalmist : 1 The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places ; yea, I have a goodly heritage. The overflowing cup educates us into the greatness it indicates. The overflow of the cup is not waste. aturalists tells us that there is utility under all beauty, a practical design in all the apparent overflow and waste of the world. Utility in the song of birds, in the perfumes of flowers, in the dyes of the sunset, in the triumphal arch of the storm. However this may be, we are sure the apparent waste of life serves some great practical end, that there is utility in the overflow of the cup, taking that word utility in a large and noble sense. In the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand, the fact that impresses our imagination most is that twelve baskets full remained ; the little that was over reveals to us the glory of the Lord and the marvellousness of His working more than all that was consumed. So in life throughout, the over flow teaches the most ; we are most served by that which in some measure goes beyond us; that which awakens our wonder, gratitude and desire. The river of God which is full of water, like the ile, enriches most in its overflow. By blessings which are beyond

168 THE WEALTH OF LIFE. definite thought, adequate expression, and regulated emotion, God educates us into the fulness of our being.

Ever looking at that which is beyond us, striving to reach that which is beyond us, our nature is drawn out, our capacities perfected. i Prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of Hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it ? ow, what is the use of a blessing there is not room enough to receive ? It makes more room : more room in the understanding, O" more room in the heart. The overflow is at once an invitation to bring a larger cup, and a development of the cnp a widening and deepening of the spirit. The goodness of God not only leads to repentance, but to perfection. 0, for the larger blessing, the full vivid consciousness of God s great love and abounding grace! Annually when the ice breaks up in Russia the Czar goes in state to drink of the River eva, and having drunk, it was long the custom for the Czar to return the cup to his attendants full of gold, but year by year the cup became so much larger that at length a stipulated sum was paid instead of the old largesse. But however large the vessel we bring to God, and however much it increases in capacity with the dis cipline of years, God shall still make it to overflow with that peace and love and joy which is better than rubies and much fine gold. Let us pray Open the fountain from above, And let it our full souls o er flow.

THE WEALTH OF LIFE. 169

The overflowing cup demands the full surrender of life to God. The full cup in our hand demands a complete sacrifice on God s altar. How can we withhold any thing from Him Who gives us all, and gives so freely? Oliver W. Holmes writes : ( If a created being has no rights which his Creator is bound to respect, there is an end to all moral relation between them Pascal, whose reverence amounted to theophobia, could treat of the duties of the Supreme to the dependent being. ( Mechanism in Thoughts and Morals.) Doubt less this is a truth we may urge against the Calvinist, but we have no need to urge it as against God. The Supreme has done his duty to the dependent being ; in His vast munificence gone beyond all conceptions of duty. The grand question for us just now is not man s rights and God s duty, but rather God s rights and man s duty. He has filled the cup, He has made it overflow right royally, and it remains now that we do our duty after the same pattern. Let us give Him an unstinted love, an obedience that runs over all the small limits of calculation and utility. I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable, unto God, which is your reasonable service.

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