Part 9

There are several inconveniences resulting from this unwillingness or inability of the members of God's family to recognize and do their own work. One of them, and that not the least, is the loss to the member himself—a loss of opportunities of usefulness, and of growth in grace. The member which is never used in its appropriate office loses its vigor, and often becomes paralyzed beyond recovery. We have all heard of the East Indian devotees, who hold their hands above their heads till they grow into that position, and cannot be taken down; and I have somewhere read of a nun who never used her hands, but kept them clasped in the attitude of prayer till the joints became useless. We think such conduct a horrible misuse of God's gifts, and rightly; but we should do well to examine ourselves, lest we fall into the same error with respect to our spiritual faculties. But as a limb which has been partly paralyzed by misuse or disuse may often be restored by care and exercise, so no one need despair of regaining a good measure of usefulness, however faulty they may have been in the past.

Another trouble is that the uselessness of some members of the body throws additional work on the others. Everyone knows that when the skin refuses its office, the lungs and other bodily organs are overworked, and often become diseased in consequence. Think, for a moment, what would be the effect if the work of any ordinary parish were fairly divided among those who were able to do their share, though that share were ever so little. Suppose, for instance, that every woman who is able should lay by two cents a week for the women's auxiliary, and should devote one hour a week to working for it! Suppose that every man capable of teaching a class of boys should next Sunday offer to do so! Suppose every church-member who has not a valid excuse should be ready to undertake any piece of work pointed out by the rector! A venerable saint of God once remarked that there were in almost every church two classes of willing members—a small class who were willing to do all the work, and a large class who were willing they should. How would the labors of the first class be lightened if the second class would awake to their duty!

Dear friends, let us examine ourselves whether we are doing our duty as members of the Church, which is the Lord's body. Let us see whether we have been shrinking or standing idly aside, and in the way of others, as idle folk almost always are. And if we find, after honest inquiry, that such has been the case, let us resolve that it shall be so no more. Let us ask forgiveness for all that is past, and with humility and docility strive hereafter, in the words of the catechism, "to do our duty in that state of life to which it shall please God to call us."

Neh. iv. Rom. xii.

_SIXTH WEDNESDAY IN LENT._

_THE HOUSEHOLD OF GOD.—Continued._

ONE of the principal duties of the members of the household or family is loyalty—faithfulness to their head and to each other. The word covers a great deal. So far as our Great Head is concerned, it means obedience first of all—constant, unquestioning, cheerful obedience. That, and that alone, is the true test of our love; as He Himself tells us: "He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me." "He that loveth Me not, keepeth not my sayings." (S. John xiv. 21-24.) We are to obey, not when we feel like it, not when it is easy, not alone when we are in the society of fellow-disciples, but at all times, and in all places. Without such loyalty, no protestations of affection, no outbursts of enthusiasm, no efforts of church or missionary zeal, are of any value in the sight of our Master.

We are "to keep and 'seek for' all the commandments of the Lord our God." (1 Chron. xxviii. 8) We are to study His written Word diligently, and not only so, but we are to watch carefully for indications of His will in our everyday lives for occasions of obedience and service. There is not one of us but can see, on looking back, a hundred occasions of doing God service, which we have allowed to pass unimproved simply from the want of watchfulness. The little events of our daily lives are so many angel messengers bringing words from our dear Head, but too often we do not see their lovely faces, because we never look at them till they have passed us by.

The path of obedience is not always made smooth and easy for us, any more than it was for our Leader. The gate is strait, the path is narrow, the hills are high, the waters deep. It was when the disciples were crossing the lake in obedience to the Lord's command that they met with the storm. It was when they were laboring in His cause that they were to be scourged and stoned and slandered by the very people they were trying to benefit. Our very carefulness and zeal for Him may lead us into collision, yes, even with our fellow-servants. But what then? The disciple is not above his Master, nor the servant above his Lord. He has never promised us an easy journey. It is much that He has placed in our way many a living spring and many a flower and shady tree, and that He shows us, from time to time, from His Delectable Mountains, a view of that Celestial City which is to be our journey's end.

We are to be loyal not in deed only, but in word as well; and, strange as it may sound, I believe this latter kind of loyalty to be rather more rare than the former. There are many disciples who will obey the Master, often at a great sacrifice, who will never open their lips for Him. They will hear His name lightly spoken of, His claims derided or denied, and never open their mouths in His defense or to assert their own faith in Him. They will believe Him to be the only way of salvation, and yet never make one effort to bring to Him their servants, their work-people, even their own children. An officer who should behave in this way where the honor of his flag was concerned would have the straps torn from his shoulders. We need not sound a trumpet before us, nor make any parade of our own goodness; but we can, and we ought always, to own our allegiance to Him, and to speak for Him. And to the end that we may do this, we must take care to walk so that our lives shall not contradict our words, and that we may speak from our own experience. "We have seen Him!" is the argument which no infidel can answer.

Is. lviii. S. John xiv.

_SIXTH THURSDAY IN LENT._

_THE HOUSEHOLD OF GOD.—Continued._

THE members of a family or household owe a duty, not only to their head, but to each other. They are bound in honor to help one another when help is needed, to sustain each other in trials, and to bear each other's burdens; and the honor of one is the honor of all, and the shame of one is the shame of all.

So it is in the Church, which is the household of God. We are members of one body, and so of each other. If one member suffers, others suffer with it; and not one can grow in spiritual grace and strength without directly or indirectly benefiting others. If one member is poor or afflicted in mind, body, or estate, his fellows are bound to help him. If he be assailed with slander or detraction, the others are bound to defend him; and so on to the end of the chapter.

I suppose that no one—certainly no church-member—will deny that these words are true in theory; there are many, thank God, to whom they are true in practice. Would to God they were so to all! But, alas! to how many are those with whom they worship on Sunday, with whom they kneel at the chancel rail even, of no more real interest than the horses they pass in the street. How many will sit next to a person in church for years, and never exchange a greeting. How many actually look down on their fellows who work for a living, or who are not of their

## particular set! A woman has been known to object to the formation of a

church guild because "it would bring in everybody on an equal footing. We would rather confine the thing to our own set." It is to be hoped such extreme instances are rare; but that rector or church worker is exceptionally happy who has never found his efforts for the good of the parish hampered by such feelings and prejudices.

Again, a woman in poor or even moderate circumstances will not go to church herself, or send her children to Sunday-school, because she cannot dress herself or them as well as somebody with twice her means. She is always looking out for affronts, and resents every kindness and attention as an attempt at patronage.

Nor is this the worst. Members of the same church will not be content with neglect or mere passive envy. They will actually try to injure one another. It is a shame to have to say it, but it is true. A man or woman will kneel at the altar with another, and partake the emblems of their dying Saviour's love. They will do this, and then, before they are fairly out of sight of the church door, will repeat a scandalous story to that person's disadvantage—a story which they do not know to be true, and which there would be no use in telling if it were. Two communicants will quarrel, and keep up a grudge for years. I have known a person leave her parish church and go to another because, as she said, she could not go to the communion with such an one; as if the Lord's body were divided into parishes! So the Lord is shamed and wounded in the house of His friends, and the world says, ironically, "See how these Christians love one another!"

Oh, dear friends, fellow members of Christ, saved by the same infinite love and pity, washed in the same atoning blood, ought these things so to be? Are we not fasting for strife and debate when we pretend to keep Lent? Have we not all one Father? Has not God created us? "Why do we deal treacherously, every man against his brother?" (Mal. ii. 10.) Can the eye say to the hand, "I have no need of thee!" or, again, the head to the feet, "I have no need of you!" (1 Cor. xii. 21.) Can we wonder that the world does not care for the Church, while it sees the members of the church so indifferent, to say the least, to one another? Oh, let this holy season see every grudge renounced, every feeling of envy or pride put away, every quarrel made up! Let the blessed feast of Easter see us working and praying and loving as one in our risen Lord! So shall we be meet partakers of that Holy Table. So shall the power of the Church for good be increased a thousand-fold, and the Lord pour out a blessing till there shall be no room to receive it.

Mal. ii. 1 Cor. xii.

_SIXTH FRIDAY IN LENT._

_THE HOUSEHOLD OF GOD.—Continued._

WE must never forget that we are members of our Lord's great family, wherever we may be. The earthly family tie is not broken by absence, by distance, or even by death. The brother in California, the father on the distant frontier, are the brother and father still, followed by faithful prayers, by fond wishes, and remembered with tender tears at every family anniversary. Even though the wanderer be a prodigal as well, though it come to this, that his name is never heard, yet he is not forgotten. His place is empty, and must remain so, because it can be filled by none but himself. He may have forgotten his duty and renounced his family name, but the tie of blood is still there, and he cannot break it if he would.

It is so in the Household of God. Once a member, always a member. We may wander away, we may ignore our duties and forget our birthright; like the prodigal, we may journey into a far country and waste our substance—which is not ours, but our Father's—with riotous living; but though rebellious, we are His children still. But not to speak of that case at present, let us look a little at one or two others. You, my friend, have not been to church in months, perhaps years. You are shut up by illness or infirmity, and cannot go into the house of the Lord. It is a great misfortune, no doubt; and yet it is not as bad as it might be. You are not cut off from the Lord's family, nor even from the services of the sanctuary. With your Bible and prayer-book you can follow the Church services throughout the Christian year. Some kind friend will keep you informed of the work that is going on in the parish, and you may perhaps be able now and then to give it a little help. Your church paper or missionary magazine will tell you the news of the Church at large, and you can at least follow with your prayers the good enterprises of which the time is so full. And if you cannot go to the Holy Communion, your pastor will gladly bring it to you. It is a wonder to me that invalids do not oftener avail themselves of this great privilege. Many persons seem to think it a service reserved for dying hours. "Has your sister had the Holy Communion since she was sick?" was the question asked of an intelligent English woman. "Oh, no!" was the answer, in a tone of surprise, "we do not think her in any danger." It is to be feared that too many look on this ordinance as a kind of magic rite, by which they are somehow to be bewitched into Heaven at last, however they may have neglected it in their lifetime.

To those who are by absence deprived of the services of our Church I would say the same. Never allow yourself to forget your church ties, any more than you would forget your family relations on account of absence, but cherish them all the more. I would not have you stay away from the public worship of your fellow-Christians, or refuse to help them in their good works. On the contrary, I would have you assist them in every possible way, and maintain the most friendly relations with them. But never, never forget your own household of faith. If possible let no Sunday or holy day pass without joining in her worship. Work for her, pray for her, speak for her, at all proper times. How often has it happened that one such faithful member has been the seed from which has grown a vine bearing fruit unto eternal life! You cannot be deprived of all church privileges so long as you have your prayer-book, and if you use faithfully what you have, the Lord will send you others. Above all things, never allow yourself to forget that you are a member of the Lord's body.

It is possible that this book may fall into the hands of some one who has forgotten his birthright, who, like the Scripture prodigal, has gone into a far country, and is trying to satisfy the hunger of his soul with the husks of this world—with money or land, or low, vile pleasures fit only for swine. To such an one let me say, your place in your Father's house and heart and table is still open to you. No one has taken it. No one ever will take it. It stands waiting for you, and unless you come home to occupy it, it must stand forever empty. Oh, my brother, my sister, remember that you are still God's child! You must be so, you cannot help yourself. Rebellious you may be, disobedient, ungrateful, lost to love, even to shame; you are still the child of God. Even though you have never been baptized in His name. He created you, and He has cared for you all these years. Return, then, to His House and His love while there is yet time, lest at last the door should be shut, and you be left to yourself, an orphan in the universe.

Dan. iv. St. Luke xv.

_SATURDAY BEFORE PALM SUNDAY._

_THE ALABASTER BOX._

THE selections of Holy Scripture set forth for the days of Holy Week are so abundant and so important that any one who studies them as they deserve will have little time for any other reading. * I propose, therefore, merely to glance at some one event of each particular day, following the chronology adopted by Dean Farrar.

* For the same reason I have named no selections from the Bible.

After the excitement which followed the raising of Lazarus, our Lord withdrew from Jerusalem to a little city called Ephraim, on the edge of the desert, where He seems to have spent some weeks in quiet and restful retirement with His disciples. Six days before the Passover He returned to the neighborhood of Jerusalem. He did not, however, enter the city immediately, but betook Himself to the little village of Bethany, the home of His chosen friends Mary and Martha, and their brother Lazarus. It was at a supper made for their honored guest that Mary's full heart overflowed in that offering which has made her name sweet through all the ages, and on which her Lord bestowed the emphatic commendation, "She hath done what she could."

She hath done what she could! She gave her Lord the very best of all that she possessed—the alabaster vase of precious perfume, costly as gold; an article of luxury, even with the rich. Are we doing the same? Do we give Him the best of our time, our means, our labors? Or do we, like the covetous Jews rebuked by the prophet, offer Him only that which no one else will thank us for? "Cursed be the deceiver who hath in his flock a male, and voweth and sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing." (Mal. i. xiii.)

She hath done what she could! If she had been able to offer no more than a bunch of sweet herbs gathered in the fields, we cannot doubt that the offering would have been as acceptable to the Lord of earth and sky as the costly ointment. He to whom belong the cattle upon a thousand hills was as well pleased with the turtle doves—the sacrifice of the very poorest—as with the oxen and sheep of the prince in Israel. Let us never hesitate to give what we can because the gift is small.

She hath done what she could! It was her love which made the offering acceptable. She first gave herself (2 Cor. viii. 5), and the rest followed, as a matter of course. Let us honestly offer and present to the Lord ourselves, our souls and bodies, our powers, our very weakness and hindrances, and having done so, let us, as some old divine says, "keep ourselves on the altar," taking back nothing of all that we have given. The altar shall sanctify the gift, and make it as worthy of our Lord's acceptance as was Mary's box of precious perfume.

_PALM SUNDAY._

_CHILDREN IN THE TEMPLE._

THE great event of the day was over. The Lord had come to Jerusalem, fulfilling the words of the prophet. His had been a triumphal entry, and for a little time it seemed, indeed, as if the world had gone after Him. Only He Himself knew how evanescent would be the feeling in his favor. Only He knew that some of the very tongues which had cried "Hosanna!" would in no long time be as ready to cry, "Crucify Him!"

But there were other voices—innocent voices—to which the Lord could listen with delight. The little children in the temple, who had followed Him thither with their parents—possibly also those employed in the musical service—continued to repeat the shouts of the multitudes on the Mount of Olives, and the spacious courts resounded with their shrill hosannas. His enemies were all the more enraged, and would have silenced them, but the Lord refused, and justified their action. "Yea, have ye never heard, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings Thou hast perfected praise"?

Nowadays the children's place in the temple is too often vacant. One sees but seldom what was once the most common of Sunday sights—the long, orderly rows of children, big and little, filling the pews on Sunday. I cannot recollect when I first went to church, but I well remember what a deprivation it was to be kept at home. If the morning service was thought too long for the very little ones, they were taken in the afternoon. But the afternoon service has been turned into the evening, when the children cannot come out (it being considered by careful mothers much more dangerous to take them to church than to dancing-school); and at the morning service the clergyman may look over twenty pews and not see half a dozen children.

Surely this is not right. Surely the praises of the little ones are as acceptable now as they were on the first Palm Sunday. Children soon learn to understand and join in the service. I shall never forget being, many years ago, in a church where the responses were made so faintly that one might think the worshippers were afraid some one would hear them. All at once, in the midst of that cold, dying murmur, arose distinct and clear the voice of a little child saying in devoutest accents, "Good Lord, deliver us." All through the Litany the sweet little tones were heard, and it was curious to hear how others near him found courage to open their mouths.

Dear friends, let us take the children to church. Let us not deprive them of their birthright. Their place is in the Sanctuary as well as ours, and they will soon learn to consider worship a privilege. They will learn to love God's house when they are young, and when they are old they will not depart from it.

_MONDAY BEFORE EASTER._

_THE FIG-TREE HAVING LEAVES._

THE Lord had, as usual, gone out of the city to spend the night. He seems to have had no love for cities in general. He spent the dark hours either at Bethany, or, as is very probable, He had slept with His disciples in the open air, under the trees of the Mount of Olives. All Orientals are rather fond of sleeping out of doors, and a night on the grass, wrapped in their big mantles, is, to them, no hardship at all. But returning to Jerusalem early in the morning, He was an-hungered; and seeing a fig-tree having leaves, He came to it, if possibly He might find fruit thereon.

The time of figs—the general harvest—had not yet come. But this

## particular tree had put on its summer dress of leaves; and therefore