Romans 11:1-10 I say then, Has God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.… 1. We are living in a time when the reigning influences of society tempt or drive from integrity and purity; and some who were venerated shock the confidence reposed in them by grievous falls. There are dangers in such times that touch conscience and try faith. But God is not changed; moral virtue is not unreal; there are still men good and true. God hath not cast away His people. There are seven thousand reserved amid the general degeneracy. 2. Baal was the idea of prolific reproduction in nature. His was a popular worship ever, and set up its accursed altars in the Holy Land. Pouring light upon the faith of the new kingdom of redeeming grace from ancient history, as was his wont, Paul goes back to that dark spot. He is showing that no matter how many fall away faith lives on. The times are never so bad that they can corrupt utterly the immortal grace that lies hidden in the heart of the Church. Mammon may establish its worship, but there is still a holy place, and an ark of the covenant, sacraments and ministry, and heavenly grace. God does not cast away His people. 3. The apostle recalls the old prophet Elijah, and makes a strong case. Matters in Church and State had come to the worst. Two tottering thrones, on soil soaked with family blood, frowned at one another in anger, but upheld no just law and protected no personal rights. Over one of the fragments of the schism ruled a tyrant — Ahab — consistent in cruelty and persevering in appetite, with Jezebel, who made royalty contemptible and womanhood shameful. Ahab and Jezebel are names of vices almost as much as of persons, and have been for nearly three thousand years. After his victory at Carmel, Elijah's splendid dream of the reformation of God's kingdom was broken. When men animated by great purposes fail, they seem smaller to themselves than ever. It was like the hiding of the face of God. But now there comes a magnificent revelation which shows that true greatness does not stand in great results that can be seen. Success does not lie in the numbers counted. Power is stored up in hidden places and in lonely consciences. Have done with measuring God's power with your geometry, or estimating His army by arithmetic. Do the duty that lies nearest thee. It scatters doubt; overcomes opposition; breaks up despair. The Almighty takes care of His reserves. We want the inspiration of this better faith. Consider two facts — I. THE INROADS OF A SUBTLE AND POPULAR WORLDLY-MINDEDNESS, WEAKENING THE CHURCH DEPLORABLY IN ITS CONSCIENCE AND ITS HEART. There is a power attacking Christianity from without, and corrupting it within. What are the foremost among the objects of the people in business and social life? Duty and righteousness? Do the young enter social life to carry there the influence of Christ? What spirit is in the ascendant in our populations? Is there not here "the man of sin" who is "anti-Christ"? Worldliness is a false god; lying, because it makes promises which are never kept; cruel, because it kills the better life; impious, because it defeats the glorious end for which God put His image in every man. This impious secularism creeps into the Church. It is charged that its converts do not come up to its standard, and that concessions are made of principle, and mercenary treacheries adopted to crowd its seats. Retribution cannot but follow if these things be true. But spiritual power is not to be judged by outward achievements. Granted that the world is as worldly, unbelief as prevalent, inconsistency as widespread, the Church as timid and supple as prophets fear or sceptics declare. "What saith the answer of God? I have reserved," etc. This opens to us the opposite fact — II. THE IMMORTAL SURVIVAL OF THE SECRET LIFE OF THE CHURCH AND OF PERSONAL PIETY, ALTHOUGH IT IS IN A MINORITY, AND COMETH NOT WITH OBSERVATION. God makes much out of little, and saves by a handful of heroes, calling up His reserves out of obscurity, and never letting His altar fires die out. Seven thousand a slight proportion. They were out of sight, scattered saints crouching in corners. Elijah was looking on things on their earthly side. Not so the All-seeing. There was an unreckoned hope in obscure men and women Elijah did not know. Always a light left burning in Switzerland, in Germany, in England, in Scotland. The gates of hell do not prevail. III. HERE IS, THEN, A LAW FOR PRACTICAL USE. What God requires of us is personal fidelity, or the earnest training of private Christian character in each one by himself, irrespective of any visible results or any possible discouragements. For this there are the clearest grounds. 1. It follows straight on in the way of the beginnings of the Church under the hand of the Lord. Get one man brave enough to do right against any maxims of a majority; one woman brave enough to lift others into her own pathway of light, and you are working precisely in the line of Him who knows what is in man, and redeems the race. 2. The doctrine is strong in that it is practicable. Every individual has one realm all his own — his conscience. Disappointed, baffled, elsewhere, he can make that all Christian. Pagan pleasures may allure others. You may not know where others — helpers — are. But your own place is in "the munitions of rocks." And the Master will always be there with you. 3. This sphere of personal Christian character touches others wonderfully, but never depends upon them so as to surrender to them if they go over to Baal. Your knees are your own to bend to whom you will. The apostles called no convention. Great reforms are in single souls before they are in parliaments, synods, or constitutions. God's harvests spring from single, solitary seeds. It is not miracle but law. The patient power of the Lord reserves His remnant of faithful hearts. His work is done first by single, then by united hands. Character, steadfast, pure, holy, is at once its force and its fruit. (Bp. Huntington.) Parallel Verses KJV: I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. |
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