Colossians 3:1-17 - Homiletics

The true Christian life.

From above only can we be raised. There is no salvation in mere antipathy. Disgust at the vanities of life, repulsion from earthly things, will of itself never lift us beyond them; it needs the superior influence of heavenly things to do that. This the Colossian errorists did not rightly understand; or they could not have made ceremonial purifications and bodily austerities the way of holiness, the means of reaching spiritual perfection. "Touch not, taste not" ( Colossians 2:20 , Colossians 2:21 ),—these were their chief commandments. The physical life was their great aversion, and to reduce and harass it was the leading object of their moral endeavours. In the last two sections of his letter ( Colossians 2:8-23 ) the apostle has denounced their system as false and mischievous, to be rejected by Christian believers, since it is not according to Christ, but is, in spite of its high pretensions, essentially base and earthly. He now proceeds, by way of command and appeal, to delineate the true Christian character, the working of Christian principles of life, as contrasted with the mystico-ceremonial and ascetic ideal of the Gnosticizing teachers. The Christian he describes is one whose "life is Christ"—a life derived from, and animated and governed by, "the Lord from heaven," and not by "the tradition of men and the rudiments of the world"—"the things upon the earth" (comp. John 6:31-33 , John 6:41 , John 6:42 , John 6:47-59 ).

I. THE HIDDEN LIFE . ( Colossians 3:1-4 .)

1 . The vital spring of a practical Christian life is personal union with Christ. "Ye were raised with Christ; your life is hid with Christ; ye shall be manifested with him; Christ is your life" ( Colossians 3:1-4 ).

2 . A true union with Christ lifts our aims above this world. "Ye were raised with Christ, seek, mind, the things above, where Christ is, for (from the things on the earth) ye died" ( Colossians 3:1-3 ). Christ has gone to heaven, and he is our Life. Thither he has carried with him our desires and hopes ( Philippians 1:23 ; 2 Corinthians 5:6-8 ). To be where he is, is the deepest longing of the Christian heart; and its attainment is the supreme reward of faithful service ( John 12:26 ; John 14:1-6 ; Revelation 3:21 ; Revelation 14:4 ). Heaven is the Christian's home, because he is there. And he has gone thither, not simply as to "the place where he was before" ( John 6:62 ), and to which he properly belongs ( John 3:13 ), but as our "Forerunner" ( Hebrews 6:20 ), the "Firstborn among many brethren" ( Colossians 1:18 ; Romans 8:29 ). Heaven is the goal which he has marked out for his followers, the "Father's house," the native city of all the members of his body, the Church ( Ephesians 1:18-23 ; Philippians 3:20 ; John 14:2 ; Hebrews 11:10 , Hebrews 11:13-16 ). "The prize of our high calling" ( τῆς ἄνω κλήσεως , "that calls us above") is bestowed at "the resurrection of the dead" ( Philippians 3:9-21 ).

3. The Christian life is, therefore, in its essence a mystery. "Your life is hid" ( 1 Peter 1:3 ).

4 . But the mystery of the Christian life is to have its revelation. "When Christ shall be manifested, then shall ye also be manifested with him, in glory" ( 1 Peter 1:4 ). This riddle of life must be solved; "the things shaken" must be removed, "that the things unshaken may remain" ( Hebrews 12:27 ); appearance must give place to reality; "mortality" must be "swallowed up of life;" God has "wrought us for this very thing" ( 2 Corinthians 5:4 , 2 Corinthians 5:5 ). Faith is the virtue of education, and must have its reward in sight; if there is nothing to be seen, then those are not "blessed," but only mistaken, "who have not seen and yet have believed" ( John 20:29 ). Hope must be crowned with fruition, or it will "put us to shame" ( Romans 5:5 ). And love, content now to "see him not" ( 1 Peter 1:8 ), is only so content on the assurance that "we shall see him even as he is" ( 1 John 3:3 ; Acts 1:11 ; John 14:3 ).

II. THE DEATH OF THE OLD SELF . (Verses 5-9.) Impurity, greed, malice, falsehood,— these are the leading features of the former life of sin which the apostle represents his readers as having followed before they became Christians. He does not, of course, charge all of them equally and alike with these offences. But then, as now, these four types of vice were prevalent amongst the great mass of ungodly men (verse 7; 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 ). Such statements, when applied to men living under the influences of Christian society, must be applied with discrimination, and in the light of our Lord's teaching addressed to the moral Jews in Matthew 5:17-48 , etc. These vices are native to the soil of the human heart ( Mark 7:20-23 ). By habitual practice they take possession of the man, so that his "members" are made "slaves to uncleanness and iniquity" ( Romans 6:19 ; John 8:34 ), and his body becomes a "body of sin" and "of death" ( Romans 6:6 ; Romans 7:23-25 ; Colossians 2:11 ). They become virtually his "members that are upon the earth" ( Matthew 5:5 ). Under the sway of sensual appetite and worldly desire, ungoverned by any influence from "the things above," his person becomes more and more completely an incarnation of sin ( Romans 7:5 , Romans 7:20 , Romans 7:23 ). These "members," then, individually and collectively, must be "put to death;" this "body of the flesh," as a "body of sin," must be "stripped off" and "done away" ( Colossians 2:11 ; Romans 6:6 ). Christ cannot dwell in the soul while "sin reigns in the mortal body" ( Romans 6:12 ). He has no "concord with Belial," or with Mammon ( 2 Corinthians 6:15 ; Matthew 6:24 ). "The old man" must be "so buried, that the new man may be raised up" in us (comp. Ephesians 4:17-24 ).

1 . Unchastity was the most conspicuous sin of the Gentile world in which St. Paul moved. There it prevailed in the grossest and most shameless forms; and its prevalence is a fearful warning, as he points out Romans 1:18-27 ), of the outcome of a godless civilization. The society of the populous Greek cities of that day was one in which "fornication, uncleanness, lustful passion, evil desire" ( Romans 1:5 ), had free course, and its moral condition was only less abandoned than the "reeking rottenness" of Sodom and Gomorrha. Adultery, indeed, was condemned as a civil crime by pagan moralists; but fornication they held, as a rule, to be an innocent and almost a necessary thing. It was in writing to Corinth, perhaps the most licentious city in that licentious age, that the apostle launched his sternest and most vehement interdict against this crime, which is a moral leprosy and pestilence. There he marks it out as peculiar from all other sins in being a sin against a man's own body, and an especial insult and outrage to the Holy Spirit who claims the human body for his temple. There are too many evidences in the state of modern society, both in high quarters and in low, that as Christian sentiment grows weak and religious faith dies down, in the same proportion the perversion of the sexual passions follows, with its invariable result in the relaxation of moral fibre, the destruction of social confidence, and the physical decay of the corrupted race. Man begins by denying his Maker, and ends by degrading himself. There are times and places where plain speaking on this subject is needful, and no prudery or sentimental delicacy should prevent it. The tempted must be warned; the guilty rebuked; bodily self respect must be taught in good time. The pure will know how to do this, like the apostle himself and like his Master, "in all purity." When once inward chastity has been lost and uncleanness spots the sou], the stain is not easily effaced. Evils of this kind flourish in the dark and love to be ignored.

2 . Covetousness is idolatry. ( Romans 1:5 .) It is, obviously and directly, "worshipping and serving the creature" ( Romans 1:25 ). While it appeases to be self love, it is really the sacrifice of self to the world, offered at the shrine of wealth, or fame, or pleasure. The man seeks to gain power over other men or things; but if this becomes his supreme desire, or if he seeks to attain it by evil means, then from that moment the object of his guilty pursuit gains power over him, and begins to entangle and enslave him ( John 8:34 ; Romans 7:23 ). His passion becomes his tyrant, his ambition an insanity, his pursuit of pleasure an infatuation. Even the thirst for knowledge, the noblest of natural desires, may grow into a selfish greed, jealous and grasping, eating out the best affections, and producing an accomplished scholar, a master of science, void of all goodness of heart and human worth. All creaturely things, regarded out of God, are but "passing shows " ( εἴδωλα , idols ) of the absolute and enduring goodness that belongs to him ( Matthew 19:17 ). The homage rendered to them—whether by the savage to his fetish, by the civilized worldling to his wealth or rank, or by the scientist to his laws and forces of nature —is idolatry, the worshipping of shams and shows, in so far as it is a departing from the living God ( Hebrews 3:12 ; Exodus 20:3 ; Isaiah 43:10 ; 1 Corinthians 8:4-6 ). And with life thus perverted at its fountainhead, it becomes a mere vanity and vexation of spirit.

3 . Malice is universally denounced. Moralists of all schools and all ages agree in proscribing this vice, though in little else. The malicious man is instinctively dreaded; he is a peril to every one. Sins of malice and of falsehood strike directly at the existence of society, while the two former classes of offence threaten it more gradually and indirectly.

4 . If impurity dishonours the body, falsehood dishonours the mind. This sin at once degrades the man, wrongs by deceiving his fellow, and insults his God, the ever present Witness and Guardian of truth ( Acts 5:4 ; Romans 9:1 ; 1 Thessalonians 2:5 ; Psalms 139:4 ; Jeremiah 5:3 ). Here the apostle points out

(a) Many men who would resist the temptation to utter a lie in so many words, will silently act it; especially in a continued course of action, where the deception lies not in any single definite act, but in the general construction which they lead others to put on their proceedings. Such deception is no less culpable in itself, and as a rule still more disastrous in its effects, than a palpable lie.

(b) And again, men find it easy to lie collectively who would not do so singly. Though men of probity in their private affairs, they will put their hands to documents, they will consent with others to acts, which they know to be misleading, or, at least, which they do not know to be true. And now that business is becoming more and more a matter of "limited liability," the perils of divided responsibility in this direction should be well understood.

5 . "Because of all these things God's anger is coming on the sons of disobedience" ( Ephesians 4:6 ). Every act or thought of any of these kinds is a disobedience, a breach of "the holy and just and good Law" under which man was first created in his Maker's image ( Ephesians 4:10 ). This "Law worketh out wrath," inexorably and perpetually, against "every soul of man that doeth evil" ( Romans 2:9 ; Romans 4:15 ). And that anger of God is coming ( Isaiah 30:27 , Isaiah 30:28 ). There is a day appointed for its "revelation'' ( Romans 2:5 , Romans 2:16 ; Ma Romans 4:1 ), even as for "the manifestation of the sons of God" ( Ephesians 4:4 ; Romans 8:19 ). It is already "revealed from heaven" ( Romans 1:18 ), and gives forewarning of its advent in many a personal and public calamity ( Isaiah 26:9 ; Ma Isaiah 3:5 ; Matthew 24:3-42 ; 1 Corinthians 5:3-5 ; 1 Corinthians 11:30-32 ). On every account, the Christian must have done with the old life of sin. He sees it to be incompatible with fellowship with Christ, to be hateful to God, to be ruinous to himself and to his fellow men. No return to it, no renewal of it, no dallying or temporizing with it in any kind or degree, can be tolerated. It must die if he is to live.

III. THE UNITY OF MANKIND IN CHRIST . ( Ephesians 4:10 , Ephesians 4:11 .) This truth belonged, at least in St. Paul's time, to the more advanced Christian knowledge, "unto which" the believer was "being renewed" ( Ephesians 4:10 ); and the Church still comes far short of its full apprehension.

1 . The gospel of Christ reveals the spiritual unity of mankind. To make this known was a part of the apostle's mission, and of the special "mystery God" entrusted to him ( Colossians 1:25-28 ; Ephesians 3:1-6 ; Romans 3:9-30 ; Romans 15:5-12 ). Its manifestation, and the consequent "breaking down of the middle wall of partition" ( Ephesians 2:14 ), were necessary to a complete Christian virtue, the proper virtue of man as man, carried out in all his relations to God and to his fellows; and for the regeneration of human society, the salvation of the world. There was a preparation for this belief in the breaking down of the old nations into the unity of the Roman empire, in the decay of local and ancestral religions, and in the advance of philosophy from the narrower and more political ethics of Plato and Aristotle to the moral system of the Stoics, which was at once more inward and more humane. But there was wanting that conception of a living, Divine centre of the human race, given in Christ, which alone could make the sentiment of universal humanity a creative, organic force.

2 . This unity has been realized in the Christian Church. It appears in the beautiful simplicity of its childlike beginning, in the communism of the infant Church of Jerusalem ( Acts 2:44 47). It was set forth in a larger and fuller way by the Apostle Paul in addressing the mixed Churches of the great cities where he laboured; and was actually put into practice there in a good degree. Jew and Greek ( Galatians 2:12 ), rich and poor ( 1 Corinthians 11:20-22 ; the exception proves the rule: comp. James 2:1-4 ), master and slave ( Philemon 1:16 , Philemon 1:17 ), met at the same table of the Lord, mingled as equals in the same Christian society, distinguished only by the measure of "grace" and "spiritual gifts" bestowed on each ( Romans 12:6 ; 1 Corinthians 12:7-11 ). And the records of the first three Christian centuries show how faithfully, on the whole, this principle was maintained, and how nobly the Church held herself superior to temporal distinctions of wealth and rank. Far indeed has she subsequently departed from this rule; and lost how much thereby in spiritual dignity and power! We admire it now as a proof of special humility if the titled or cultured man forgets amongst Christian brethren his worldly eminence; if the employer of labour is glad to sit at the feet of his workman, when that workman, as may often be the case, is his spiritual superior; if the wealthy contributor to a Church fund does not expect, on that account, to dictate in its management.

3 . The Church is destined to gather mankind into a spiritual common, wealth. In it there is to be no "strife as to who shall be greatest;" but in humility and self forgetfulness "the greater shall be as the younger, and the chief as he that doth serve" ( Luke 22:24-26 ). There "all are brethren, with one Master even Christ" ( Matthew 23:1-39 . 8-12). All authority and office are derived from him, and attested by his Spirit in his people ( 1 Corinthians 12:1-11 ; Acts 1:24 ; Acts 13:1-52 . I 4; Galatians 1:1 ; John 20:21 ). The Church is his body, complete in him —a unity in itself and in its action, because in every limb it draws its life and gets its direction from the Head. And as the Church becomes a greater and more pervasive power in the world, the spiritual brotherhood it creates will work appeasingly on the "wars and fightings," on the aristocratic exclusiveness and haughtiness, the democratic bitterness and jealousy, the invincible prejudices, the clashing interests, by which society is distracted and its bonds are strained almost to rending, and the nations are kept in arms and hurled repeatedly against each other in deadly conflict. When mankind recovers its unity in him in whom it was created and redeemed, when it is reconciled to God and bows its every knee "at the name of Jesus,"—then at last there will be "peace on earth." Where "Christ is all and in all" antipathy must cease.

IV. THE NEW CHRISTIAN CHARACTER . ( Ephesians 4:12-17 .) We have traced the principle of the Christian life in its inner ground and aim, as "hid with Christ" and seeking its home in heaven ( Ephesians 4:1-4 ); in its uncompromising and mortal warfare with the old life of sin ( Ephesians 4:5-9 ); in its purpose to form a new humanity in the individual soul, and in the world at large ( Ephesians 4:10 , Ephesians 4:11 ). We are now to follow its practical working, to see how the "new man" is to show himself in a new habit and style of living, how the "hidden life" is to blossom out into its fragrance and beauty, and its "celestial fruit" to "grow on earthly ground." We note that the Christian character is one derived from God and that refers to God in everything. It is as "God's elect, his holy and beloved ones' ( Ephesians 4:12 ), that we are called to assume the new habits of Christian grace and goodness. Knowing what the Divine Father is, and what he has done for us ( Colossians 1:12-14 ), and what he intends us to be ( Ephesians 1:4-6 ), sensible of our filial relation to him ( Romans 8:15-17 ; Galatians 4:1-7 ; 1 John 3:1 , 1 John 3:2 ), loyally embracing his will ( Romans 6:22 ) and seeking to be conformed to his nature as that is translated for us into "the image of his Son" ( Romans 8:29 ; 2 Peter 1:4 ; 1 John 4:17 ), we shall be "holy in all manner of conversation." But God is known to us through Christ. And, therefore, in the formation of the Christian character "Christ is all and in all" ( Ephesians 4:13 ; 1 Corinthians 11:1 ; Romans 15:3 ; Philippians 2:5 ; 1 Peter 2:22 ; 1 John 2:6 ; John 13:15 ). It is nothing else than Christ formed in us ( Galatians 4:19 ). In the perfect Christian character, then:

1 . Christ's love rules. ( Ephesians 4:13 , Ephesians 4:14 ; 2 Corinthians 5:14 ; 1 John 3:23 ; John 13:34 .) The tender heart of compassion, the gentle, sympathetic kindliness, the lowliness of mind, the uncomplaining meekness, the patient long-suffering, the forbearance and forgivingness ( Ephesians 4:12 , Ephesians 4:13 ) of the Christian nature,—these centre in the all-perfect and all-perfecting grace of Christ-like love ( 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 .; 1 John 4:7-21 ; Romans 13:9 , Romans 13:10 ). He in whose heart dwells the love of Christ cannot "shut up his compassion" from any within reach of help who need it ( 1 John 3:17 ); cannot be rude and ungracious, or hard and unforgiving ( Ephesians 4:31 , Ephesians 4:32 ; 2 Corinthians 2:5-11 ); cannot be self-asserting, clamorous, overbearing; cannot be passionate and resentful, irritable and fault finding, obstinate in prejudice, intolerant of opposition. The love of Christ will assimilate his whole disposition and make it sweet, gracious, unselfish, loving, and lovable as that of an innocent child ( Matthew 18:1-4 ). And the Christian man who in the spirit of this love can "possess his soul in patience" through all the strenuous endeavours and painful collisions and vexing wrongs of life, wears "the girdle of perfectness," and has attained the perfect Christian temper.

2 . Christ's peace guards. ( Ephesians 4:15 .) The Christian's faith and hope are assailed by a thousand enemies. Sometimes amid the common incidents of life, sometimes in "the heavenly places" of his richest experience and most exalted communion with spiritual things ( Ephesians 6:12 )—sometimes brought about by open and palpable causes, sometimes by strange influences shadowing the inner life and coming we know not whence or how—sometimes through the ruggedness and gloom of his providential rule, sometimes through mental perplexities and the chilling and confused intellectual atmosphere around him,—in any or in all of these ways "the trial of his faith" comes—comes, in one shape or other, to every man who has a faith worth trial. And then, whatever be the form which the assault takes or the quarter from which it is directed, he may find in "the peace of Christ" his strong tower of defence and harbour of refuge. His difficulties may not disappear under this influence; his doubts may not be at once dispelled; the conflict may still rage furiously around and within him; but he will be kept, the fortress of his heart will not be surrendered ( 1 Peter 1:5 ; Philippians 4:7 ). So long as "we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ," and "his love is shed abroad in our hearts" ( Romans 5:1-5 ), nothing can shake our essential faith or rob us of our immortal hope ( Psalms 27:1-14 .; 46.; Luke 12:32 ; Revelation 1:17 ), Neither sophistry ( Colossians 2:4 ) nor threatening ( Colossians 2:18 ) will take from us "the prize of our high calling." "One thing," at any rate, "we know" ( John 9:25 ); and to it "we have the witness in ourselves" ( 1 John 5:10 ), in "the peace of God, which passeth all understanding," "to which we were called," in the "new heart and right spirit" he has "put within" us, in the moral victory attained over self and the world ( 1 John 5:4 , 1 John 5:5 ): "we know that we have passed from death unto life" ( 1 John 3:14 ). And we safely infer that he "who has begun a good work in us" will carry it through ( Philippians 1:6 ); that he will keep that which we commit to him, and "none shall pluck us out of his hand" ( 2 Timothy 1:12 ; John 10:27-29 ; Romans 8:31-39 ). So, unitedly and thankfully, we "hold fast the beginning of our confidence, and the glorying of our hope, firm unto the end" ( Hebrews 3:6 , Hebrews 3:14 ).

3 . Christ's word inspires. ( Ephesians 4:16 .) It is to "dwell in the heart richly"—to be the welcome visitant and constant inhabitant of the mind; to be listened to and diligently learned; to be cherished and pondered in inward meditation, not as an object of theoretic study only, but as the power which is to shape the character and guide the life of the Christian ( Deuteronomy 6:6-9 ; Psalms 119:105 ; John 17:17 ), as the soul's daily nutriment—the bread of God, "which strengtheneth man's heart," "the word of eternal life" ( Deuteronomy 8:3 ; Jeremiah 15:16 ; Matthew 4:4 ; John 6:63 , John 6:68 ),

4 . Christ's name hallows everything. (Verse 17.) Our eating and drinking—acts which seem the most ordinary and purely physical, and quite remote from the interests and sentiments of the spiritual life—these are to be "sanctified by the word of God and prayer" ( 1 Timothy 4:5 ), by the mention of Christ's name in thanksgiving to the Father, who through him sends us all life's blessings. And if our mere animal necessities of life are capable of being thus hallowed, there is nothing in family relations, or secular employments, or social or civil duties, which may not receive and does not demand the same consecration. We may associate Christ with everything we do, doing all as his servants and under his eye, and in such a way that, by every part of our work, he may be glorified in us. And this will be a safeguard to the Christian man. If he is to do everything in Christ's name, he must do nothing unworthy of that name, nothing with which he cannot associate it. Nowhere, in any company or on any business, must he forget, "either in word or deed," that this "worthy name" is the name which he bears, and whose honour is in his keeping. This is the seal that marks the true Church of Christ, which every Christian wears upon his heart: "Let every one that nameth the name of the Lord depart from unrighteousness" ( 2 Timothy 2:19 ).

Verse 18—Colossians 4:1—Sect. 8

The Christian view of family duties.

Certain general considerations bearing on the family and social constitution of life may be drawn from the teaching of this section.

1 . We note that the apostle brings each of the three primary relationships of which he speaks into connection with "the Lord." The natural order of human life is grounded in Christ. If "all things were created and do consist in him" ( Colossians 1:16 , Colossians 1:17 ), then, amongst the rest, this also and in chief. For man in his relation to the world around him is "the image of God," even as Christ is to the whole universe ( 1 Corinthians 11:7 ; James 3:9 ; Genesis 1:26 ; Psalms 8:1-9 .). And man is not a solitary individual; he is a social being, a race unity. And those relations which are essential and fundamental to human society—marriage, sonship, service—have, most of all, their spiritual type and creative ground in Christ. This is obvious in the case of the two latter relations; as to the first, see Ephesians 5:22-32 .

2 . The intrinsic fitness of a right discharge of natural duties is affirmed in the first case ( Ephesians 5:18 ), and implied in the other two. The apostle recognizes and appeals more than once to the sense of ethical propriety, that which "nature itself teaches" ( 1 Corinthians 11:14 ), which belongs to the universal conscience surviving in our nature though fallen and debased. All true sentiments of natural morality the Christian revelation reaffirms and supports with its effectual sanctions, "as is fit in the Lord" (comp. Philippians 4:8 ). Their consciousness of the right as the beautiful ( τὸ καλόν ) was a sound and valuable element in the teaching of the best Greek moralists. They regarded conduct as a work of art, in which grace and fitness were to be studied, and the perfection of an ideal beauty to be the aim of life. While men may have, as a rule, a stronger sense of the right, women better understand the fitting; and it is in regard to the place and duties of woman that St. Paul appeals to convictions of moral fitness and decorum.

3 . We are taught, indirectly, to cherish a pleasant and cheerful temper in domestic life. Bitterness ( Ephesians 5:19 ) and harshness, with the distrust and timidity which they engender ( Ephesians 5:21 ), and a sullen or constrained obedience ( Ephesians 5:23 ), are forbidden; and these are the common elements of domestic unhappiness. Where the husband is gentle, and the father tender though strict, and the master considerate, and the servants willing and honestly anxious to please, there all goes well. Whatever storms may beat upon that house from without, there is peace and sunshine within. And this is "well pleasing in the Lord."

4 . The principle of authority is steadfastly maintained throughout. ( Ephesians 5:18 , Ephesians 5:20 , Ephesians 5:22 .) In every house that is not to be "divided against itself," there must be a single head, a ruling will, a definite centre of power and direction. And that power God has placed, as a solemn trust, in the hands of the husband, father, master, who is in his prerogative within his own house an image of Christ in the Church ( Ephesians 5:23 ; Colossians 4:1 ), of God himself, the Father of men ( Hebrews 12:9 ). This principle is the corner-stone of order in human society. Here is "pure religion breathing household laws" (Wordsworth).

I. HUSBAND AND WIFE . ( Ephesians 5:18 , Ephesians 5:19 .) The marriage relation stands first, being the basis of the family, which again is the basis of society and of the community of mankind. "He which made them from the beginning, made them male and female" ( Matthew 19:4-6 ). Marriage is to be "had in honour among all" ( Hebrews 13:4 ; 1 Timothy 4:1-3 ); and not merely the criminal act, but any impure word, thought, or look which offends against its sanctity, "defiles the man" from whom it proceeds, offends in an especial way the Holy Spirit of God, and brings down his wrath upon the offender. The degree of honour and reverence in which it is held in any society largely, determines the degree of soundness in its moral condition. Where the opposite vices prevail, whether secretly or openly practised, general moral corruption and decay set in (see homiletics, sect, 7, II . 1).

1 . On the one side, there is to be submission. The apostle says, "Children,… servants, obey" ( Ephesians 5:20 , Ephesians 5:22 ); but not " Wives, obey your husbands:" "Be in subjection" ( Ephesians 5:18 ) is a gentler and fitter term to use. Obedience implies a certain distance and inferiority that has no place here. There is something wrong on one side, or on both, when the husband gives formal orders to his wife. There should be such an intimacy of mutual understanding and sympathy between them, that they seem to have but one mind and will in all common matters, And while to that single mind the wife contributes the queenly influence of her insight and persuasion, she will feel and show that resolve and direction belong to him and not to her. The final responsibility for the business of the house devolves on the husband, by the ordinance of God and by the nature of things, which are but two expressions of the same fact ( 1 Corinthians 11:3-15 ). It is his part to "rule well his own house" ( 1 Timothy 3:4 ).

2 . It was not so needful to say, "Wives, love your husbands;" though the apostle once enjoins this, in speaking of "the younger women" in Titus 2:4 . For failure on the wife's side in this respect is comparatively rare. But the man, full of business, often absent, and with his more exacting nature, is more liable to fall into some disloyalty. He allows other company to become more agreeable to him; seeks amusements and pursuits in which his wife cannot join; no longer makes her his confidante and the sharer of his inner life; and allows home to become little more to him than a selfish convenience. And with this selfishness and the uneasiness of conscience that attends it, there supervenes often an irritableness of temper that chafes over every domestic care or trouble, and makes no allowance for infirmities in others; that magnifies every trifling mistake or mishap into an injury, and ignores the wife's patient affection and eagerness to please. How different is all this from the exalted ideal that St. Paul holds up to the Christian husband!—"Love your wife even as Christ loved the Church, and gave himself for her" ( Ephesians 5:25 ). Bengel's shrewd and caustic remark on this passage is too often verified: "There are many, who out of doors are civil and kind to all; when at home, towards their wives and children whom they have no need to fear, they freely practise secret bitterness."

II. FATHER AND CHILD . (Verses 20, 21,)

1 . From children, obedience to their parents in all things is required, and therefore in many things contrary to their inclination and opinions. Childhood means dependence and ignorance. It is only under the shelter of parental oversight that the incipient faculties and plastic nature of the child can be formed to the strength of judgment and firmness of character which will enable him to meet the tasks and the perils of adult life. And for this discipline to be effective, the submission of the child must be absolute. Only when a parental command plainly contradicts the Law of God and violates the child's conscience, can any kind of disobedience be justified. In that case, obedience cannot be "well pleasing in the Lord." But even the worst of parents will rarely be found to have so little respect for the conscience of childhood as to enforce such an injunction. The requirement addressed to the child presumes that the parent exacts obedience. This is his inalienable prerogative. Instant, unmurmuring obedience should be made the habit of the child's life, and as a law of nature to it. To have this understood from the first is the simplest and easiest course. If the child be allowed, through passion or persistence, once successfully to rebel, a mischief is done not easily to be repaired. His own self mastery, and the sense of law and of duty which are to attend him through the whole of life, largely rest on this basis of ingrained obedience. For this purpose, children should be in their earliest years as much as possible under the direct influence of their parents' presence and authority. The parental office cannot be discharged by proxy. And there must be unity of parental administration, as well as harmony between precept and practice, if a true and reverent obedience is to be possible. In no State was the authority of the father ( patria potestas ) so strict and absolute as in ancient Rome. And there can be little doubt that this stern maintenance of family discipline largely helped to form the Roman character with its extraordinary vigour and tenacity, and to preserve that rigid, firmly knit order and devoted loyalty which were the secret of Rome's invincible strength.

2 . On the other hand, the father must beware lest his authority should wear a needless aspect of severity. His righteous desire to "command his children and his household after him" ( Genesis 18:19 ), and his anxious sense of responsibility, may occasion this, if not relieved by more genial influences. The innocent liveliness and the many unintended offences of childhood must not provoke him to ill temper. He must learn by patience and tenderness to win the child's affection and open-hearted trust, without impairing its submissive reverence. A mechanical, unsympathetic strictness, or an angry and unequal discipline, will fatally alienate the sensitive heart of the child, which in that case either sinks down into a dull, spiritless apathy, or prepares for a passionate revolt when the hour of its strength shall come. Too often those most anxious to commend religion to their children have made it odious by presenting it in forms unintelligible to the young mind, and associating it with tasks unsuited to its powers, and burdens that it found "grievous to be borne." As the child should find in the child Jesus its pattern and model ( Luke 2:40-52 ), so the parent should seek to be to his children an image of "our Father in heaven."

III. MASTER AND SERVANT . (Verse 22— Colossians 4:1 .) This third relationship is one which we may be sure will continue to exist, however varied the forms it may take, so long as the world stands. And what the apostle says here is of universal application, though slavery has happily given place to free service. Even when our lower classes shall have become so far raised in intelligence and independence that cooperation in industrial labour will become the rule instead of the exception, still there must be some to command, others to obey. Indeed, the more extended and complicated the operations of trade and manufacture become, the more thoroughly labour needs to be organized and authority graduated, and the more entirely success depends on management and discipline and on a right adjustment of the relations of master and servant.

1 . From servants Christianity demands, what conscience demands, an honest obedience, that serves as well behind the master's back as to his face (verse 22). As a mere matter of commercial advantage, the uniform presence of this quality would be an incalculable economy and enrichment of the community. And religion secures this, directly and of necessity. The man who does his work in God's sight—"as ever in his great Taskmaster's eye"—and as for the judgment day, cannot scamp any part of it. He is serving, not a man like himself, but a heavenly Lord, whose searching eye is always upon him, who understands and can judge every man's work (verse 24; 1 Peter 1:17 ), and who has promised infinite rewards for faithfulness in the "few things" of our earthly probation ( Matthew 25:21 , Matthew 25:23 ). These convictions form the best guarantee, with the mass of men the only sufficient and effectual guarantee, for good work and thorough workmanship in every department of life.

"A servant with this clause,

Makes drudgery divine;

Who sweeps a room as for thy laws,

Makes that and the action fine."

(George Herbert.)

2. And the Christian master, whether at the head of a farm or a factory, of a commercial house or a private family, will remember that he has his duties along with his rights as a master. He is dealing with human beings, not with machines. The laws of political economy are not to be his only guide. "The nexus of cash payments" can never be the sole link that associates any two men together. Woe be to him if he says, with Cain, "Am I my brother's keeper?" ( Genesis 4:9 ). "Just dealing and fairness" ( Colossians 4:1 ) must rule in the relations of master and man, if they are to be on a moral and righteous footing. He will not take a hard advantage of his servant's necessity; or allow, if he can help it, his dealings with him to degenerate into a mere struggle between capital and labour for every inch of vantage. The cruel greed that grasps at immediate gain at whatever cost of toil and poverty to others, and that "grinds the faces of the poor" ( Isaiah 3:15 ), may enrich the individual, but in the long run is fatal to the class or the trade which practises it. And the rich oppressor will have to appear at a tribunal where "there is no respect of persons" (verse 25). Political economy itself teaches that ill-paid labour is the most expensive and wasteful. The man who has want and fear gnawing at his heart cannot be a good workman, even if, in spite of extreme temptation, he be an honest one. Injustice and over reaching on the part of the rich and governing classes, political and social institutions that favour "the fat and the strong" at the expense of the weak and poor ( Ezekiel 34:16-27 ), are sure of God's heavy judgment. They generate in the hatred excited in those subject to them an explosive force which, with a suitable train of circumstances, will burst forth, as in the French Revolution, in some volcanic upheaval that the strongest social fabric will be unable to resist. Christ's golden rule of equity ( Luke 6:31 ) is the only safe, as it is the only righteous, basis for the dealings of man with man, of class with class, or of nation with nation in the world's great polity.