Ezekiel 18:4 Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sins, it shall die. I. EVERY LIVING SOUL IS, IN A SENSE, THE SUBJECT, THE SHARER, OF THE PRIVILEGES, THE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 1. There is, without contradiction, the privilege of life. Life! what is life? Ah! who can answer, and yet who can fail to understand? "What am I? says a father of the Church; "what I was has vanished; what tomorrow I shall be is dark." "We do not know ourselves; we do not understand our own nature," echoes the scarcely Christian philosopher: the further we go by natural reason, the deeper the darkness, the greater the difficulty; and yet the corn that waves in the autumn wind, the flower that opens in the spring morning, the bird that sings in the leafy thicket, nay, in a sense, the very wave that ripples on the beach, much more the heaving swell of human multitudes that throng the city streets, all conspire to sing the song, the solemn song of life; and the pulses of the young heart vibrate to the music, — growth, movement, reality; the past is dim, the future inscrutable, but here at least is a great possession, the mystery, the thrilling mystery, of individual life. Better than silent stone, or sounding waves, or moving worlds, is one who holds the eternal spark of life. Whatever comes, we feel, we know it, it is something to have lived. This is what it means. It is to have been single, separate, self-determining. Yes; man feels his own life; he is an object of his own consciousness; he is, and he can never change in such sense as to be another self. 2. Another privilege of this lofty place in the scale of being is immortality. Man's ordinary moods may suit a finite life. But these — this lofty aspiration, keen remorse, unsatisfied desire, these infinite unspoken yearnings, these passionate affections — whence come they? There is one answer, only one. From the depth of a conscious being, whose life, whose personality, is not bounded by the grave. Man is immortal. So dimly dreamed the ancients. Alas, too often it was but a dream. Cicero was busied in "Platonic disquisitions," as it has been said, "on the immortality of the soul"; but when his darling Tullia died, he and his friend could only fancy that "if" she were conscious she would desire comfort for her agonised father. Still, there was the dream of immortality. Seneca spoke of it as a dream. "I was pleasantly engaged," he wrote to his friend, "inquiring about immortality; I was surrendering myself to the great hope; I was despising the fragments of a broken life. Your letter came, the dream vanished." Was it only a dream? At least it was "a great hope." A dream, but destined to become a waking vision! A hope, one day to be a clear reality! Christ came — came in His sweet simplicity, came in His deep humility, came with His great revelation. Christ came; came and placed it in evidence, by His Divine teaching, by the indisputable need of a future life for the fulfilment of His lofty principles, and last by that stupendous fact of which the apostles, testing it by their senses, testing it by all varieties of available evidence, knew and affirmed the truth — the miracle, the unique, the crowning miracle, of the resurrection. 3. I instance one further privilege of the soul — The intuition of moral truth, and with this the sense of moral obligation. An image emerges in the Gospel, unique, beautiful; a picture suited for all situations, unchangingly powerful amid all changes of inner and outer life. The German rationalist is perplexed by His perfection; the French infidel is startled by His beauty; the modern Arian is constrained to admire, while he inconsistently denies the assertion of Godhead, which, if falsely made, would shatter that image of perfect beauty. Yes, the old saying — s saying — is true, "O soul, thou art by nature Christian"; as He only sanctions thy yearnings for immortality, so Jesus only satisfies thy sense of moral beauty. He does more. The soul, approving, desires to love; but love requires an object — what object like Thee, O uncreated beauty! II. If the soul is so endowed by God, it follows necessarily that GOD HAS A CLAIM UPON THE SOUL. It is on success in realising, remembering, acting upon this truth of our relationship to God, that so much of our true happiness and, I may add, our true dignity depends. Of what character is this claim? 1. God has a rightful claim upon our conscious dependence. And you must render Him this service, oh! you must carefully render it, for many reasons — Clearly, because to do so is to do that which all sensible men should strive to do, to recognise and reverence facts. You do depend on God. Never imagine that, like an intrusive caller, you can bow God politely and contemptuously out of His creation; in spite of your puny insolence He is there. 2. Such recognition is only a just outcome of gratitude. Count up your blessings; perhaps they are so familiar to you, so strongly secured to your possession by what seem, from habit, indissoluble bonds, that you have forgotten that they are blessings. Better at once awake from that dream. The keeping alive the sense of conscious dependence upon God exercises upon our character a great moral influence. We never rise to the dignity of nature but by being natural. This dependence is one of those pure facts of nature which has imbibed none of the poison of the fall. Two powers accrue to the soul from cultivating the sense of it — resignation and strength. The Christian learns that the hand that gives, and gives so lavishly, may rightly be trusted to take away. All of us, — we may settle it in our minds, with no morbid fearfulness, but with quiet certainty, — all of us most sooner or later suffer — ay, and sharply. Let us pray so to know Him who made us, so to depend upon Him now, that when it pleases Him to try our constancy, we may, with a real resignation, "suffer and be strong." Seek your strength where alone it will be found available in a moment of crisis; cherish and stand upon the great thought of God. III. GOD'S PRESERVING AND SO RICHLY ENDOWING THE SOUL GIVES HIM A CLAIM THAT IN ITS PLANS AND ACTIVITIES HE SHOULD HAVE THE FIRST PLACE. "Religion is that strong passion, that powerful virtue, which gives the true colour to all else." Give Him you first thoughts in the morning; try to act as in His presence, for His glory; let the thought of Him restrain a sinful pleasure, gladden an innocent delight; love Him through all He gives you, and all He gives love in Him. Young men, young women, remember it — "Them that honour Me I will honour." He depends on you for a portion of His glory. Angels do their part in song, in work, in worship; yours they cannot do. One work He called you to do. You entered the world, at a fixed time, to do just that work. When death comes, will it find you working in that spirit? IV. GOD MAKES THIS CLAIM UPON YOU, THAT YOU DESPISE NO SOUL. This is difficult. We live in an age when, more than ever, judgment goes by appearances — an age of rush, of competition. The lad whom the schoolmaster ignored as stupid may turn out a Newton. The little newspaper boy you pass as so much lumber in the street may prove a Faraday; even intellectually, we may be mistaken. But a soul, as a soul, demands respect. Despise no soul, however debased and grimed and soiled. These souls are God's. The corruption of the morals of the poor pains you? It is true — lamentable how imposture dries the springs of charity and makes a cynic of the Christian. Never mind, life is full of sadness; but keep the heart fresh. In spite of all, there are beautiful souls about the world; and for all souls Jesus died. Despise no soul. At least, O Christian, pray for them. V. SOME SERIOUS LESSONS. 1. The first is individual responsibility. Philosophers have fancied that each movement of thought displaces some molecule of the brain, so that every airy fancy registers itself in material fact. Anyhow, this is true: every free choice of the creature between good and evil has an eternal import, and it may be, it will be if you will have it so, a splendid destiny. "What shall I do, my father?" asked the barbarian conqueror, as he stood awe-stricken before the aged Benedict. Calmly the saint replied in this fashion, "My son, thou shalt enter Rome." "And then?" "Then thou shalt cross the sea, shalt sweep and conquer Sicily." "And then? Then thou shalt reign nine years; and then," said the father, "then thou shalt die, and then thou shalt be judged." We may hope, in part at least we may believe, the lesson was not lost on Totila. My brothers, have we learnt that lesson? The grave prerogative of the soul is this: life's struggle over, then it "shall be judged." 2. The soul's true beatitude is to know God. "Acquaint thyself with God, and be at peace." Duty and communion make up life, the life that is worthy of a soul. Is it yours? Remember, O soul, thy princely rank; aspire to God by a true, a loving life. (Canon Knox Little.) Parallel Verses KJV: Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sinneth, it shall die. |
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