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The Christian Life written by Thomas Arnold

T >> Thomas Arnold >> The Christian Life




But let us observe what it is that he said: "A time is coming when I
shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but shall show you plainly of
the Father." That time came immediately. He spoke to them after his
resurrection, opening their understandings to understand the Scriptures:
he spoke yet more fully, by his Spirit, after the day of Pentecost,
leading them into all truth. And what they thus heard in the ear, they
proclaimed, according to his bidding, upon the house-tops. When the Holy
Spirit brought to their remembrance all that he had said to them, and
gave their minds a spiritual judgment, to compare what they thus had
brought before them, to see his words in their true light and their true
bearings, comparing spiritual things with spiritual, they were no
niggards of this heavenly treasure; nor did they, according to the vain
heresy of the worst corrupters of Christ's gospel, imitate and surpass
that sin which they had so heavily judged in Ananias. They kept back no
part-of that which they professed and were commanded to lay wholly and
entirely at the feet of God's church. They did not so lie to the Holy
Ghost, as to erect a wicked system of priestcraft in the place of that
holy gospel of which they were ministers. They had no reserve of a
secret doctrine for themselves and a chosen few, keeping in their own
hands the key of knowledge, and opening only half of the door; but as
they had freely received, so they freely gave; all that they knew, they
taught to all: and so, through their blessed teaching, we too can
understand our Lord's words as they were taught to understand them: and
what is parabolical, is no longer on that account obscure, but full of
light and of beauty, fulfilling the end for which it was chosen, the
most effective of all ways of teaching, because the liveliest.

I have left myself but little space to touch upon the second part of the
subject--the general lesson conveyed in our Lord's-words to his
disciples: "Sleep on now, and take your rest.--Rise; let us be going."
How truly do we deserve the reproof; how thankfully may we accept the
call. We have forfeited many opportunities which we would in vain
recover; we have been careless when we should have been watchful; and
that for which we should have watched, is now lost by our neglect; and
it is no good to watch for it any more. Let us remember this, while it
is called to-day; for how often is it particularly applicable to us
here, from the passing nature of your stay amongst us! To both you and
us too often belongs our Lord's remonstrance, "What, could ye not watch
with me one hour?" So short a time as you stay here, could we not be
watching with Christ that little period: from which, if well improved,
there might spring forth a fruit so lasting? But, alas! we too often
sleep it away: we do not all that we might do, nor do you; evil grows
instead of good, till the time is past, and you leave us; and we may as
well sleep on, and take our rest, so far as all that particular good
was concerned--the improvement, namely, of your time at this place, for
which we are alike set to watch. But are we to take the words of
reproach literally? May we really sleep on, and take our rest? Oh vain
and wilful folly, so to misunderstand! But, lest we should
misunderstand, let us hear our Lord's next words: "Rise; let us be
going," and that instantly: the time and opportunity already lost for
ever is far more than enough.--"Rise; let us be going:" so Christ calls
us; for he has still other work for us to do, for him, and with him. The
future is yet our own, though the past be lost. We have sinned greatly
and irreparably; but let us not do so yet again: other opportunities are
afforded us; the disciples would not watch with him in the garden, but
he calls them to go with him to his trial and his judgment; and one, we
know, watched by him even on his cross:--so he calls to us; so he calls
now; but he will not so call for ever. There will be a time when we
might strike out the words, "Rise; let us be going;" they will concern
us then no more. It is only said, "Sleep on now, and take your rest: all
your watching time has been wasted, and you can now watch no more;"
there remains only to sleep--to sleep that last sleep, from which we
shall then never wake to God and happiness, but in which we shall be
awake for ever to sin and to misery.




LECTURE XXXVI.

* * * * *

2 CORINTHIANS v. 17, 18.

_Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new: and all
things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ_.


I have, from time to time, spoken of that foolish misuse of the
Scriptures, by which any one opening the volume of the Bible at random,
and taking the first words which he finds, straightway applies them
either to himself or to his neighbour; and then boasts that he has the
word of God on his side, and that whosoever differs from him, is
disputing and despising the word of God. The most extreme instances of
this way of proceeding are so absurd, that they could not be noticed in
this place becomingly; and these, of course, stand palpable to all,
except to those who have allowed themselves to fall into them. But far
short of these manifest follies, great errors have been maintained on
general points, and great mistakes, whether of over presumption or of
over fear, have been committed as to men's particular state, by quoting
Scripture unadvisedly; by taking hold of its words to the neglect or
actual violation of its spirit and real meaning. This is a great and a
very common mischief, but yet there is a truth at the bottom of the
error; it is true, that the greatest questions relating to God and to
ourselves, may find their answer in the Scriptures; it is true, that if
we search for this answer wisely we may surely find it.

Consider the words of the text, and see how easily they may be
perverted, if with no more ado we take them, as said of ourselves, each
individually, and as containing to each of us a statement positive of
truth. "Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."
If we believe that this is God's word respecting each of us, what
violence must we do to our memory of the past, and our consciousness of
the present, if we do try to persuade ourselves that so total a change
has taken place in each of us, that what we once were, we are no longer;
that what we are, we once were not; and this not in some few particular
points, but in the main character of our minds. Again, "All things are
of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ." If we apply
these words to each of us, what exceeding presumption would they breed!
If all things in us and about us are now of God, what room can there be
for sin? If God hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, what room
can there be for fear or for danger? And thus, while we say we are
quoting and believing the word of God, we do in fact turn it into a lie;
we make it assert a falsehood as to our past state, and a falsehood as
to our future state; we make it say, that our old nature is passed away,
when it is not; that we have got a new nature when we have not; that we
are reconciled to God, and therefore in safety, when we are, in fact, in
the extremest danger.

But it is easy to see that we have no right to apply to ourselves words
written by St. Paul eighteen hundred years ago, and applied by him to
other persons. I go, then, farther; and I say, that if every member of
the church of Corinth, to which they were written, had applied them to
himself in the manner which I have shown above, the words would in many
instances have been perverted no less, and would have been made to state
what was false, and not what was true. And the same may be said of many
other passages of St. Paul's Epistles, which, having been similarly
misinterpreted, have furnished matter for endless controversies, and on
which opposite theories of doctrine have been fondly raised, each of
them alike unchristian and untrue.

Thus our present position is this:--that oftentimes by taking the
representations of Scripture as true in fact, whether of ourselves or of
others, we come to conclusions at once false and mischievous; being, as
the case may be, either presumptuous, or fearful, or uncharitable, and
claiming for each of these faults the sanction of the word of God.

A similar mistake in interpreting human compositions, has led to faults
of another kind. Assuming as before, in interpreting St. Paul's words,
that the language of our Liturgy is meant to describe, as a matter of
fact, the actual feelings and condition of those who use it, or for whom
it is used; and seeing manifestly that these feelings and condition do
not agree with the words; we do not here, as with the Scripture, do
violence to our common sense and conscience, by insisting upon it that
we agree with the words, but we find fault with the words as being at
variance with the matter of fact. Some say that the language of the
General Confession is too strong a statement of sin; that the language
of the Communion Service, of the Baptismal Service, and above all, of
the Burial Service, is too full of encouragement and of assurance; that
men are not all so bad as to require the one, 'nor so good as to deserve
the other; that in both cases it should be lowered, to agree with the
actual condition of those who use it.

Now it is worthy of notice, at any rate, that the self-same rule of
interpretation applied to the Scripture and the Liturgy is found to suit
with neither. We adhere positively to our rule: and thus, as we hold the
words of Scripture sacred, we force common sense and conscience to make
the facts agree with them; but not having the same respect for the words
of the Liturgy, we complain of them as faulty and requiring alteration,
because they do not agree with the facts.

I will not enter into the question whether the Liturgy has done wisely
or not in thus imitating the Scripture; but I do contend that, in point
of fact, there is this resemblance between them. St. Paul's Epistles, in
particular, although it is true of other parts of the Scripture also,
contain, as does the Liturgy of our Church, a great many passages which,
if taken either universally or even generally as containing a matter of
fact, will lead us into certain error. Is it, therefore, so very certain
that we do wisely in so interpreting them?

With regard to our Liturgy I need not follow up the question now; but
with regard to St. Paul, it is certain that he, in many parts of his
Epistles, chooses to represent that which ought to be as that which
actually was: he chooses to regard those to whom he is writing as being
in all respects true Christians, as being worthy of their privileges, as
answering to what God had done to them, as forming a church really
inhabited by the Holy Spirit, and therefore being a true and living body
of due proportions to Christ its Divine head. Nor does he trust
exclusively to the common sense and conscience of those to whom he was
writing to interpret his language correctly. He might Lave thought
indeed that if he wrote to them as redeemed, justified, sanctified, as
having all things new, as being the children of God, and the heirs of
God, and the temples of the Holy Ghost, any individual who felt that he
was none of these things, that sin was still mighty within him, and that
he was sin's slave, would neither deny his own conscience, nor yet call
St. Paul a deceiver; but would read in the difference between St. Paul's
description of him and the reality, the exact measure of his own sin,
and need of repentance and watchfulness. But he does not rely on this
only: he notices sins as actually existing; he mingles the language of
reproof and of anxiety, so as to make it quite clear that he did not
mean his descriptions of their holiness and blessedness to apply to them
all necessarily; he knew full well that they did not: but yet he knew
also that, considering what God had done for them, it was monstrous that
they should not be truly applicable.

But why then, you will say, did he use such language? why did he call
men forgiven, redeemed, saved, justified, sanctified?--he uses all these
terms often as applicable generally to those to whom he was
writing;--why did he call them so, when in fact they were not so? He
called them so for the same reason which, made prophecy foretell
blessings upon Israel of old, and on the Christian church afterwards,
which were fulfilled on neither:--in order to declare, and keep ever
before us, what God has done and is willing to do for us: what he fain
would do for us, if we would but suffer him; what divine powers are
offered to us, and we will not use them; what divine happiness is
designed for us, and we will not enter into it. Let us ponder all the
magnificence of the scriptural language,--the words of the text for
example, not as describing what we are when we are full of sin; nor yet
as mere exaggerated language, which must be brought down to the level of
our present reality. Let us consider it as containing the words of
truth and soberness; not one jot or one tittle needs to be abated; it
must not be lowered to us, but we rather raised to it. It is a truth, it
is the word of God, it is the seal of our assurance: it is that which
good men of old would have welcomed with the deepest joy; which, to good
men now is a source of comfort unspeakable. For it tells us that God has
done for us, is doing, will do, all that we need; it tells us that the
price of our redemption has been paid, the kingdom of heaven has been
set open, the power to walk as God's children has been given: that so
far as God is concerned we are redeemed, we are saved, we are
sanctified; it is but our own fault merely that we are not all of these
actually and surely.

This is not a little matter to be persuaded of; if it be true, as I fear
it is, that too many of us do not love God, is it not quite as true that
we cannot believe that God loves us? Have we any thing like a distinct
sense of the words of St. John, "We love God because he first loved us?"
We believe in the love of our earthly friends; those who have so lately
left their homes have no manner of doubt that their parents are
interested in their welfare, though absent; that they will often think
of them; and that, as far as it is possible at a distance from them,
they are watching over their good, and anxious to promote it. The very
name home implies all this; it implies that it is a place where those
live who love us; and I do not question that the consciousness of
possessing this love does, amidst all your faults and forgetfulnesses,
rise not unfrequently within your minds, and restrain you from making
yourselves altogether unworthy of it. Now, I say, that the words of the
text, and hundreds of similar passages, are our assurance, if we would
but believe them, that we have another home and another parent, by whom
we are loved constantly and earnestly, who has done far more for us
than our earthly parents can do. I grant that it is hard to believe this
really; so infinite is the distance between God and us, that we cannot
fancy that he cares for us; he may make laws for a world, or for a
system, but what can he think or feel for us? It is, indeed, a thought
absolutely overpowering to the mind; it may well seem incredible to us,
judging either from our own littleness or our own forgetfulness; so hard
as we find it to think enough of those to whom we are most nearly bound,
how can the Most High. God think of us? But if there be any one particle
of truth in Christianity, we are warranted in saying that God does love
us; strange as it may seem, He, whom neither word nor thought of created
being can compass; He, who made us and ten thousand worlds, loves each
one of us individually; "the very hairs of our heads are all numbered."
He so loved us, that he gave his only-begotten Son to die for us; and
St. Paul well asks, "He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him
up for us all, will he not also with him freely give us all things?"

Believe me, you could have no better charm to keep you safe through, the
temptations of the coming half year, than this most true persuasion that
God loves you. The oldest and the youngest of us may alike repeat to
himself the blessed words, "God loves me;" "God loves me; God has
redeemed me: God would dwell in my heart, that I might dwell in him: God
has placed me in his church, has made me a member of Christ his own Son,
has made me an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven." I might multiply
words, but that one little sentence is, perhaps, more than all, "God
loves me." Oh that you would believe him when he assures you of it, for
then surely you would not fail to love him. But whether you believe it
or not, still it is so: God loves every one of us; he loves each one of
us as belonging to Christ his Son. He does love each, of us; let us not
cast his love away from us, and refuse to love him in return; he does
love each of us now, but there may be a time to each of us,--there will
be, assuredly, if we will not believe that he loves us, when he will
love us no more for ever.




LECTURE XXXVII.

* * * * *

EZEKIEL xx. 49.

_Then said I, Ah, Lord God I they say of me, Doth he not speak
parables_?


Nothing is more disheartening, if we must believe it to be true, than
the language in which some persons talk of the difficulty of the
Scriptures, and the absolute certainty that different men will ever
continue to understand them differently. It is not, we are told, with
the knowledge of Scripture as with that of outward nature: in the
knowledge of nature, discoveries are from time to time made which set
error on the one side, and truth on the other, absolutely beyond
dispute; there the ground when gained is clearly seen to be so; and as
fresh sources of knowledge are continually opening to us, it is not
beyond hope that we may in time arrive infinitely near to the enjoyment
of truth,--truth certain in itself, and acknowledged by all unanimously.
But with Scripture, it is said, the case is far otherwise; discoveries
are not to be expected here, nor does a later generation derive from,
its additional experience any greater insight into the things of God
than was enjoyed by the generations before it. And when we see that
actually the complete Scriptures have been in the world not much less
than eighteen hundred years; that within that period no other book has
been so much studied; and yet that differences of opinion as to the
matters spoken of in it have ever existed, and exist now as much as
ever, what reasonable prospect is there, it is asked, of future harmony
or of clearer demonstrations of divine truth; and will not the good on
these points ever continue to differ from the good, and the wise to
differ from the wise?

This language, so discouraging as it is, may be heard from two very
opposite parties, so that their agreement may appear to give it the more
weight: it is used by men who are indifferent to religious truth, as an
excuse for their taking no pains to discover what the truth really is;
it is echoed back quite as strongly by another set of persons who wish
to magnify the uncertainties of the Scripture in order to recommend more
plausibly the guidance of some supposed authoritative interpreter of it.
But yet it ought to be at any rate a painful work to any serious mind to
be obliged to dwell not only on the obscurities of God's word, but on
its perpetual and invincible obscurities; and, though an interpreter may
be necessary if we know not the language of those with whom we are
conversing, yet how much better would it be that we should ourselves
know it: nay, and if we are told that we cannot know it, that our best
endeavours will be unable to master it, the suspicion inevitably arises
in our minds, that our pretended interpreter may be ignorant of it also;
that he is not in truth better acquainted with it than we, but only more
presumptuous or more dishonest.

Still a statement may be painful, but at the same time true. There is
undoubtedly something in such language as I have been alluding to, which
appears to be confirmed by experience. There is no denying the fact,
that the Scriptures have been a long time in the world; that they have
been very generally and carefully read; and yet that men do differ
exceedingly as to religious truth, and these differences do not seem to
be tending towards agreement. It seems to me, there fore, desirable
that every student of the Scriptures should know, as well as may be,
what the exact state of the question is; for if the subject of his
studies is really so hopelessly uncertain, it is scarcely possible that
his zeal in studying it should not be abated; nay, could we wisely
encourage him to bestow his pains on a hopeless labour?

Now, in the very outset, there is this consideration which many of us
here are well able to appreciate. We read many books written in dead
languages, most of them more ancient than any part of the New Testament,
some of them older than several of the books of the Old. We know well
enough that these ancient books are not without their difficulties; that
time, and thought, and knowledge are required to master them; but still
we do not doubt that, with the exception of particular-passages here and
there, the true meaning of these books may be discovered with undoubted
certainty. We know, too, that this certainty has increased; that
interpretations, which, were maintained some years ago, have been set
aside by our improved knowledge of the languages and condition of the
ancient world, quite as certainly as old errors in physical science have
been laid to rest by later discoveries. Farther, our improved knowledge
has taught us to distinguish what may be known from what may be probably
concluded, and what is probable from what can merely be guessed at. When
we come to points of this last sort, to passages which cannot be
interpreted or understood, we leave them at once as a blank; but we
enjoy no less, and understand with no less certainty, the greatest
portions of the book which, contain them. And this experience, with
regard to the works of heathen antiquity, makes it a startling
proposition at the very outset, when we are told that with the works of
Christian antiquity the case is otherwise.

We thus approach the statement as to the hopless difficulty of
Scripture, confirmed, as we are told it is, by the actual fact of the
great disagreements among Christians, with a well-grounded mistrust of
its soundness; we feel sure that there is something in it which is
confused or sophistical. And considering the fact which appears to
confirm it, I mean the actual differences between Christians and
Christians, it soon appears by no means to bear out its supposed
conclusion. For the differences between Christians and Christians by no
means arise generally from the difficulty of understanding the Scripture
aright, but from disagreement as to some other point, quite independent
of the interpretation of the Scriptures. For example, the great
questions at issue between us and the Roman Catholics turn upon two
points,--Whether there is not another authority, in matters of
Christianity, distinct from and equal to the Scriptures,--and whether
certain interpretations of Scripture are not to be received as true, for
the sake of the authority of the interpreter. Now, suppose for a moment,
that the works of Plato or Aristotle were to us in the place of the
Scriptures; and that the question was, whether these works of theirs
could be understood with certainty; it would prove nothing against our
being able to understand them, if, whilst we look to them alone, another
man were to say, that, to his judgment, the works of other philosophers
were no less authoritative; or, if he were to insist upon it, that the
interpretations given by the scholiasts were always sure to be correct,
because the scholiasts were the authorized interpreters of the text. No
doubt our philosophical opinions and our practice might differ widely
from such a man's; but the difference would prove nothing as to the
obscurity of Plato's or Aristotle's text, because another standard had
been brought in, distinct from their works, and from the acknowledged
principles of interpretation, and thus led unavoidably to a
different result.

The same also is the case as to the questions at issue between the
Church of England and many of the Dissenters. In these disputes it is
notorious that the practice and authority of the church are continually
appealed to, or, it may be, considerations of another kind, as to the
inherent reasonableness of a doctrine; all which are, again, a distinct
matter from the interpretation of Scripture. One of the greatest men of
our time has declared, that, in the early part of his life, he did not
believe in the divinity of our Lord; but he has stated expressly, that
he never for a moment persuaded himself that St. Paul or St. John did
not believe it; their language he thought was clear enough, upon the
point; but the notion appeared to him so unreasonable in itself, that he
disbelieved it in spite of their authority. It is manifest, that, in
this case, great as the difference was between this great man's early
belief and his later, yet it in no way arose from the obscurity of the
Scripture. The language of the Scripture was as clear to him at first as
it was afterwards; but in his early life he disbelieved it, while, in
his latter life, he embraced it with all his heart and soul.