Verses 1-21
The Christian Ideal
Anew section of the Epistle would seem to open with the twelfth chapter. The eleventh chapter concludes with "Amen": but Amen was not necessarily a final word with the Apostle Paul. He had his own way of writing. He began again after he was supposed to have finished; always another idea occurred to him; evermore there was a light beyond on which he must dwell if only for a moment, and scarcely had he indicated that beam than there dawned upon that ardent mind mornings brighter than he had ever seen. We shall know from the application the meaning of the sermon. In very deed there are parts of the sermon we cannot understand. The Epistle to the Romans is intensely theological, doctrinal, here and there bewildering, metaphysical. We do not know what the Apostle means; probably he hardly knew his own meaning; that is to say, he saw things which he could only shadowingly indicate and not substantially develop and represent. It was a wonderful mind. To be near the Apostle Paul was to be at school; to read one of his epistles is to see that we have not yet begun our education. Yet who could be so simple, so practical? Who could be so definite in exhortation? We shall know from the twelfth chapter onward all that he has been talking about; that is to say, we shall know in practical exhortation what we never for a moment could understand in metaphysical disquisition. It is even so with men in the Church and men everywhere. There can be but few metaphysicians. All men must be workers, must attend to the practical side of life, must accept discipline, and must work out some policy or theory of being. If we could establish ourselves in this conviction, infinite trouble would be saved and infinite mischief would be prevented. The danger is that all men think themselves metaphysicians. As a matter of fact, there is only a man here and there who ought to meddle with the philosophy of things; the millions should live on the outside: work, attend to practical duties, and accept the conclusions wrought out for them either by philosophy on the one hand or experience on the other. Those who cannot understand the first eleven chapters of the Epistle to the Romans should begin at the twelfth chapter.
"I beseech you therefore." The term "therefore" may be a term in ratiocination, and probably was in this instance; or it may be an ebullient word, his feeling is so excited as to become itself a form of reasoning, and he will have all men do something because God's way is so mysterious, yet withal so beneficent. "...by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies." This is a reference to the general constitution of human nature; it is not a word which could be replaced by the other and vaguer word "yourselves": when the Apostle says bodies in this connection he means bodies flesh, the outward, lower, meaner self; so that not only the tenant should be a hero, but his house should be a sanctuary. Lay the emphasis upon the word "bodies": the flesh must be broken down, subdued, overruled, refined, glorified. Nor is this to be done by mutilation, or by the barbarous custom of ancient times of putting the knife to the jugular vein and causing the body to die. This is to be a living sacrifice: every member complete, yet each member doing its work simply, lovingly, obediently; the whole body alive, but controlled, disciplined, and turned to highest and sweetest utility. This is the difference between the old sacrifices and the sacrifice required under the Gospel. It is easy to kill a bullock, easy to offer a thousand rams: but we are called to the spiritual sacrifice of being dead yet living, of passing through our own death into newness of creatureship, the upper mystery and the broader mystery of spiritual resurrection. Hence, the folly of monasticism, and mutilation, laceration, and those starvings and contempts with which the body is visited by merely mechanical disciplinarians. We are not to shut the ear lest we should hear music. We are to open the ear and say, Let me hear you: I can judge you now. Are your tones pure? Is your meaning sacred? Play on, sing on, I can discriminate; I will reject the suggestion of evil, I will respond to the tone of purity. We are not to hide ourselves away from the recreations and the amusements and the entertainments of life: but we are to say, What are you? what can you do? what is your power? what scope have you? We are now above you: once we were on a level with you and we were dragged as by cart ropes and waggon chains behind you; but now we can take you up and set you down, use you, make a convenience of you, and it is impossible for you to so besiege us by vicious importunity as to make any conquest over us. We are living sacrifices; not dead bodies, but living bodies; every drop of blood intact, every drop of blood a drop of fire; and yet we pray. To this vocation we are called. We are not amputated, depleted, or disabled men; but we are full, complete, crowned men, and have that highest of all sovereignty, the sovereignty of ourselves. Thus Paul's theology is practical conduct. Apostolic metaphysics must end in human good behaviour. Theology is not a quibble in words, a trick in logomachy; it is an attainment in character. Theologians that never come out of the theological cloud ought never to have got into it; they misrepresent the kingdom of God, they are word-choppers, and murderers of human thought and language, and spoiling wolves that are seeking to live upon the flock of Christ. Any sermon that does not come out in a grand application ought never to have been delivered. The sacrifice is to be "holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service" which is the service of your reason. The Apostle will not have reason driven out of the Church. The Pauline Church is a church of rationalists in the highest, truest sense of that term in fact in the only high and true sense. Rationalism that does not include God is reason without head, or hands, or faculty that can be turned to use: a blind teacher prating of colour which it has never seen. The Apostle will have our reason sanctified. Reason should be a worshipper; reason should take the covering from its lofty head and bow before the Cross in reverent obeisance. That is Paul's idea, and Paul is the teacher of Christians, whatever else he may or may not be.
Does the apostolic exhortation end with the body? The answer is found in the next verse: "And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." In the first verse the body is put into its right relation to God; in the second verse the mind is put into its right relation to things infinite and eternal. Thus the whole man is consecrated. "Be not conformed to this world." Why not? Because it is not a world at all, in any sense of completeness. It is too small for the mind. Even science is growing contemptuous. There was a time when the world eight thousand miles through was thought to be a great world; now it is thrown aside as something that may be called for, or may not be called for, according to the exigencies of tomorrow. Be not conformed to your cradle, O men. The cradle is a silver one, the cradle is a beautiful one. Yes, but it is a cradle still, and you are men. There was a time when it was roomy enough, the very house you wanted, better than all the king's palaces at Babylon; but now that ye have become men, that your minds are awake, that you can see the distant, and see that which to the untrained sense is invisible, be not conformed to your cradle, but be ye transformed, take on other capacities rightfully yours and claim all the worlds. For what purpose? For the purpose of making stepping-stones of them. There is not one of them on which you may not put your foot, as a man might put his foot upon a step that he might higher go. The mind is to be renewed, made new, made young, made fresh like a dewy morning, made lithe like an energy that cannot be tired. To what end? That it may become a faculty of moral criticism; that ye may prove, test, look carefully into, and know what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God; and know the will of God from that which is supposed to be the will of God; that you may have the faculty of discrimination, the judgment that will not be satisfied with broad definitions, but must go into critical distinctions, so that the mind cannot be imposed upon by a false revelation. If any man be in Christ Jesus, part of the Lord Jesus, absorbed in the Lord Jesus, you cannot palm upon him a forged epistle. Say, This we have found bearing the autograph of Paul; he needs no scholar learned in little words with all their verbal changes and alterations in order to tell him whether it is true or not; it comes against him, and he receives it as a friend, or he comes against it, and he assaults it as an enemy. Inspiration is not in the word but in the breathed spirit, in the pleading importunity, in the dazzling wisdom, in the lofty call. The mind that has been renewed and invested with critical discrimination can read any amount of false literature, and cast it out with an ejection significant of burning contempt. We are to be able to do two things: first to find out what is the will of God, and secondly to find out the best way of doing it. This we can never do except by long days and nights spent in the school of Christ under the tuition of God the Holy Ghost.
Now the Apostle clothes himself with apostolic authority and proceeds "For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." The English can make nothing of Paul's talk. If the English language were pressed into an exact expression of Paul's conception it would sound almost grotesquely, certainly it would be heavy and distasteful to the merely literary palate. The Apostle will have every man minded to be sober-minded, minded to be modest-minded. He is not to think soberly in the sense of thinking languidly, or without the urgency of passion, but he is to think in the direction of sober thinking, to be minded to sober-mindedness, with honest clear-headed mindedness that cannot be imposed upon. By what measure is this to be measured? "according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." That is one of the things forgotten in the Church. It is supposed that all men can have equal faith. When folly of that kind is insisted upon in the Church what wonder we have all manner of heterodoxy within its borders? One man has little faith, and you cannot give him more; another man is all faith, and he never talks in prose. The Lord gave to every man what every man has; he made one a painter, another a poet, another a preacher, another a merchantman; he made one woman bright as Elizabeth Barrett Browning, subtle as George Eliot; he made another woman the mother of the house, taking care of everything, cumbered about many things, loving all that belongs to home, and making home the sweetest little church under the sun all these are equally the gift of God. So in the Church he made one man possess great faith, and another man has hardly any faith at all. Is the man of little faith to be disesteemed and cast out? Verily no: "Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations.... Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand." Only let him know that he has next to no faith and therefore ought to be a silent member of the Church; only let him know that he has no business to say who is orthodox and who is heterodox; only let the babe in the cradle take no part in household economy; then we shall have a Church marked by an infinite variety of gift, tone, colour, pulse, force; and it is for God to blend the differences into one solid harmony.
"Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith." Literally: Having then gifts of grace, differing according to a sovereignty we cannot control, let us recognise differences. Of differences we have made a very vicious use. We have thought they were signs of schism, signs of separation, signs of disharmony. They are the very glory of the Church. Differences should be welcomed; contrasts should not be unknown in the kingdom of Christ. One man could not be an Arminian, another man could not be a Calvinist; one man must have all men saved, another man would be content to have a few saved if he thought that God himself wanted it to be so; the man would crush his own instincts, his own natural benevolence, if he once got hold of the prejudice that God himself only wanted a certain percentage of humanity to be saved. These men cannot live in the same Church, simply because they do not recognise differences; they are non-apostolic; they must build themselves separate sanctuaries, and worship God at different altars. Instead of this we should have in the same Church all manner of Baptists, all manner of theologians, every possible variety of thinker. We must not make God's providence monotonous, we must not take out of God's kingdom the lights that sometimes appear to cross one another. "According to the proportion of faith": literally, according to whatever faith each man has. The words have often been prostituted to false uses, that we must preach so much upon one subject, then so much upon another, and then rectify the balance by an allusion to other subjects. No such meaning is to be found in Paul's words; his simple meaning is, Every man has a gift of faith, and according to every man's particular gift of faith let him work, whether he be prophet or minister or servant or exhorter. Here is the reconciliation of all things. The mischief always is that the man who has little faith will quarrel with the man who is all faith. It is very rarely you hear the great dog bark, but the little dog no whip can keep quiet. Be sure that if a man has little faith he has tremendous criticism: in proportion to the littleness of his faith he is able to tell who is on the down-grade, who is on the up-grade, who is right, and who is wrong. He pronounces his own condemnation. The Apostle Paul recognises differences, proportions, dowries to start the world with: all he insists upon is personal simplicity and sincerity in the conviction wherewith we are called. Is any man called to be a poet? let him gather his singing robes around him, and awake with the lark, and sing to us from heaven's gate of the glory land and all the vision that makes heaven's eternal summer. Is any man called to be a servant? let him stoop to his work honestly and lovingly, and worshippingly, and he shall find in the ground the mystery wrought by the sun, roots rich with fruit. Is any man called to give? let him give with both hands richly, simply; "let him do it with simplicity," that is, with only one meaning. Simplicity is the single fold, open and read of all men; duplicity is the double fold, between the folds who can tell what may be hidden? complexity is the multifold; simplicity is lost. He that giveth let him give with simplicity, with an open, frank, generous nature; not asking how much other people are going to give, not making an investment of it, not causing it to suffer because being done ostentatiously, but let him give with real genuine heartiness. "He that sheweth mercy with cheerfulness." There is a mercy which says, Now behold me, I am going to be very merciful: I could crush you, but I will not; I could just simply annihilate you, but I will not; I could bring to bear upon you an instrument that would grind you to powder, but I will not. The Apostle Paul will not have mercy of that kind. Mercy is to be radiant, tuneful, joyous, happy; mercy is to say, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet; bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat, and be merry: for this my son was dead, and is alive again; lost, and is found; make the welkin ring! The Apostle Paul will have good things done in a good way. He will have nothing slovenly. If you are called to be a prophet, prophesy according to your faculty, your spiritual gift, your immense faith. "Or ministry:" serving, that is; let us attend to our ministering our serving, and be absorbed in it. Or if we are called to teaching let us sit down with the little scholars and make them understand first the letter, then the syllable, then the word, then the thought, then the music. Or if we are called to exhortation: literally, to encouragement, to stimulate men, cheer them on under difficult tasks: let us wait on that function as if it were the greatest in the Church. It we are called to rule, let us do it "with diligence"; and if we are called to show mercy let mercy come forth, not robed in sackcloth with ashes sprinkled on its head, but let mercy be liberated like an angel, and come out to sing its pardons and proclaim its welcomes in music.
Prayer
Saviour of the world, open thou our eyes that we may behold wondrous things out of thy law. The law of the Lord is perfect: do thou perfect us in pureness that we may read thy book with wise and understanding minds. Help us also to begin at Moses and all the prophets, and to read in all the Scriptures the things concerning Christ. We bless thee for thy book; it is a fountain full of water, it is a sun pouring down the morning and the noontide upon our way of life; it is a shield and buckler, a great sword and a mighty defence, it is bread and water; it is like its Lord, it is all things, bright, beautiful, good, and tender. Enable us to walk right through this whole paradise of revelation; may we notice everything, may nothing escape the attention of our love: thus shall we know thy book to be like thyself, O Christ, and we shall say concerning thy book, Its name is Wonderful. We thank thee for what it has done for us; thy book has directed our way, comforted us in our sorrow, upheld us when our poor strength was giving way; it has been full of promises and songs to us in the time of dejection and in the night of great fear. May we see in this land and in all the lands a revived interest in God's own book; may we all gather around it as around the only book worth reading, because it contains the revelation of God, the music which souls need, and because in it and round about it and above it there shines a wondrous mystery of mercy and love, of sacrifice and redemption. We bless thee for all thou hast given unto us; now wilt thou crown all thy gifts by opening our understanding that we may understand the Scripture. May the word of Christ dwell in us richly; may we so know thy word that none can impose upon us by offering us another; may we know thy music, thou Son of God, so well that we shall rise in instant indignation against any one who shall offer to defraud us or impose upon us. Grant unto us the great mind, the penetrating judgment, the responsive heart, which thou hast promised to those who are like little children. Make us little children in simplicity and in love, in self-distrust and in all pureness of mind; then shall thy book be above us as the sun is above the earth, yet not too far away from the little earth to be able to warm it and gladden it, and make it bright with summer. The Lord hear us in every prayer that is breathed at the Saviour's Cross, and cleansed by the Saviour's blood. Amen.
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