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As a person is daily conversant with that society to which he belongs, maintaining fellowship with them, and ordering his life according to their rules, so the Apostle lived, as it were, in heaven: his thoughts and affections were there continually: and he was emulating those around the throne by his constant endeavours to glorify God, and by walking habitually in the light of his countenance.

Remember, too, that it is in Bethlehem of Juda that Jesus is born; and be very careful lest you fail to be found there, lest He fail to be received by you. Bethlehem is the house of bread; Juda signifies confession or praise. If, then, you replenish your soul with the food of the Divine Word, the Body of our Lord Jesus Christ, and devoutly receive the Bread which came down from heaven, and which giveth life to the world; if the vessel of your body is made strong and able to hold the new wine by being refreshed and strengthened with His new and glorified flesh; if, moreover, you live by faith, and have no need to weep because you have forgotten to eat your bread, then, indeed, you are become a Bethlehem fitted to receive our Lord.

There are some, however, who are ashamed of the cross of Jesus Christ, and say: If we should believe that, we should be despised everywhere, especially by the wisest. But if you would know the truth, look only on the lives of those who would have to cry woe on their unbelief if they should be measured by deeds. If you are ashamed of the cross, the Lord was not ashamed to bear that cross for you, and to die on that cross for you. Be not ashamed of His service and of the defence of the truth. Look at the servants of the devil, who are not ashamed in the open places, in the palaces, and everywhere to speak evil and to revile us. Bear then a little shame only for your Lord; for whoever follows Him, will, according to our Gospel, in His name drive out the devil; that is, he will drive out his sins, and lead a virtuous life; he will drive out serpents; he will throw out the lazy who come into the houses, and say evil things under the pretence of righteousness, and so are like poisonous serpents. You will see how children can withstand them with the truth of God, and drive them away.

‘Train them up in exact obedience to yourselves, and break them of their own wills.’ … The common course of parents is to please their children so long, by letting them have what they crave, and what they will, till their wills are so used to be fulfilled, that they cannot endure to have them denied; and so can endure no government, because they endure no crossing of their wills. To be obedient, is to renounce their own wills, and be ruled by their parents’ or governor’s wills; to use them therefore to have their own wills, is to teach them disobedience, and harden and use them to a kind of impossibility of obeying. Tell them oft familiarly and lovingly of the excellency of obedience, and how it pleaseth God, and what need they have of government, and how unfit they are to govern themselves, and how dangerous it is to children to have their own wills; speak often with great disgrace of self-willedness and stubbornness, and tell others in their hearing what hath befallen self-willed children.

There are two things from which our weak human nature shrinks—pain and shame. Christ came to take both from us, and this He did by accepting both in His own person—when, for instance, not to mention other occasions, He was condemned to death, and to a most shameful death, by wicked men… Behold here an Infant without stain! Behold the Lamb without spot, the Lamb of God, Who taketh away the sins of the world! Who could better take them away than He Who knew no sin? He, indeed, can cleanse me, who has never Himself been defiled. His touch can remove the clay from my eyes, for His hand is free from the lightest dust. He can take the mote from out my eye Who has no beam in His own; or, rather, He Who has no smallest grain of dust in His own eye can take the beam from mine.

Notwithstanding all this, the Child, the Lamb without spot, is circumcised. Though He stood in no need of circumcision, He willed to submit to that humiliating ceremony. Though He was without wounds, He shrank not from binding up our wounds. This is not the way the impious act; it is not thus with the perversity of human pride. We glory in our wounds, and blush to have them bound up and healed; while He Whom no man can convince of sin is the remedy of sin, and, without any necessity on His own part, receives both its shame and its punishment, and submits to the sacrificial knife.

“Be not ashamed of your faith; remember it is the ancient gospel of martyrs, confessors, Reformers, and saints. Above all, it is the truth of God, against which the gates of hell cannot prevail. Let your lives adorn your faith, let your example recommend your creed. Above all, live in Christ Jesus, and walk in Him, giving credence to no teaching but that which is manifestly approved of Him, and owned by the Holy Spirit. Cleave fast to the Word of God, which is here mapped out to you. May our Father, who is in Heaven, smile on us as ever!

Or how great importance the wise and holy education of children is, to the saving of their souls, and the comfort of the parents, and the good of church and state, and the happiness of the world.

Happy the soul who has tasted this fruit of salvation, and is drawn to “run in the odour of his ointments,” that she may “see his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father.” Take courage, you who were lost: Jesus comes to seek and save that which was lost. Ye sick, return to health: Christ comes to heal the contrite of heart with the unction of His mercy. Rejoice, all you who desire great things: the Son of God comes down to you that He may make you the co-heirs of His kingdom. I beseech you, then, O Lord, heal me, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved; glorify me, and I shall be glorious. Then indeed shall my soul bless the Lord, and all that is within me praise His Holy Name, when He shall have been merciful to my iniquities, have healed my infirmities, and have filled my desire with good things.

Fallen man is wholly departed from God; and is become altogether selfish; seeking at all times his own things …. One would have supposed, that man, however fallen, should at least have given a precedence to his God: but he chooses rather to be a god unto himself, and to consult, in the first place, what will be most conducive to his own ease, or interest, or honour. If the gratification of self, in any respect, be found contrary to the declared will of God, the authority of God is set at nought; the honour of God overlooked, as unimportant; and the pleasure, whatever it may be, is pursued, without restriction or remorse. From their fellow-man, indeed, they feel some restraint; but from God, none at all. As far as he is concerned, they say, “Our lips are our own: Who is lord over us?” …. In truth, man in his fallen state does not admit any competition between God and him. He chooses rather to “cast God behind his back,” and to live “without him in the world.” “The things of Jesus Christ” do not at all engage his thoughts. He never asks himself, ‘What would the Lord Jesus Christ wish me to do? What will please him? What will honour him? What will advance his glory in the world?’ These are considerations which never enter into his mind. Nor is this the case with any one particular description of persons only: it is the same with all persons, of every age, of every country, of every condition. From infancy to old age there is the same regard for self, to the utter exclusion of every thing that relates to Christ. There may be indeed, and often is, in ungodly men, a great concern about their own sect or party in the Church; which they, perhaps, would call a regard for Christ himself. But this is nothing more than a carnal principle, precisely similar to that which actuates men in relation to their own society or country. There is in it no real regard for the Lord Jesus Christ himself, but only for the particular party to which they belong: and, whatever construction they may put upon their actions, God, who tries the heart, will comprehend them under the censure of my text, as “seeking their own things, and not the things of Jesus Christ.” “They are empty vines, because they bring forth fruit only to themselves.”

Vast numbers of men are pleased with the seemingly new idea that “dogma” is of no great importance … The consequences of this widespread dislike to “dogma” are very serious in the present day. Whether we like to allow it or not, it is an epidemic which is just now doing great harm, and specially among young people. It creates, fosters, and keeps up an immense amount of instability in religion. It produces what I must venture to call, if I may coin the phrase, a “jelly-fish” Christianity in the land: that is, a Christianity without bone, or muscle, or power. A jelly-fish, as every one knows who has been much by the sea-side, is a pretty and graceful object when it floats in the sea, contracting and expanding like a little, delicate, transparent umbrella. Yet the same jelly-fish, when cast on the shore, is a mere helpless lump, without capacity for movement, self-defence, or self-preservation. Alas! it is a vivid type of much of the religion of this day, of which the leading principle is,—“No dogma, no distinct tenets, no positive doctrine.”—We have hundreds of “jelly-fish” clergymen, who seem not to have a single bone in their body of divinity. They have no definite opinions; they belong to no school or party: they are so afraid of “extreme views” that they have no views at all.—We have thousands of “jelly-fish” sermons preached every year, sermons without an edge, or a point, or a corner, smooth as billiard balls, awakening no sinner, and edifying no saint.—We have legions of “jelly-fish” young men annually turned out from our Universities, armed with a few scraps of second-hand philosophy, who think it a mark of cleverness and intellect to have no decided opinions about anything in religion, and to be utterly unable to make up their minds as to what is Christian truth … And last, and worst of all, we have myriads of jelly-fish worshippers,—respectable church-going people, who have no distinct and definite views about any point in theology. They cannot discern things that differ, any more than colour-blind people can distinguish colours. They think everybody is right and nobody wrong, everything is true and nothing is false, all sermons are good and none are bad, every clergyman is sound and no clergyman unsound. They are “tossed to and fro, like children, by every wind of doctrine;” often carried away by any new excitement and sensational movement; ever ready for new things, because they have no firm grasp on the old; and utterly unable to “render a reason of the hope that is in them.” All this, and much more, of which I cannot now speak particularly, is the result of the unhappy dread of “dogma” which has been so strongly developed, and has laid such hold on many Churchmen, in these latter days.

If we are right in our interpretation of the restless struggles of our times, and of the Bible, then missions are not a department of church activity, the evangelization of the world is not one of the varied functions of the church to be fulfilled by an annual collection put upon the same plane with a dozen others; it is the goal of all church labor, it is the end for which the Christian church exists.

Of all kinds of preaching, I love the expository most. You will understand this from the fact that I have, during the last seven years, expounded most of the first two books of the Pentateuch, the whole book of Nehemiah, the whole of Ecclesiastes, and nearly half the Gospel of Matthew. I care less and less for mere catch-texts and for small ingenuities in pulpit mechanics. Our cleverness is our destruction as expositors. In its exercise we lose breadth, substance, and dignity, and become mere tricksters and jugglers. I care very little for merely literary polish in preaching. We want intelligence, unction and directness. All the rest is comparatively worthless. The preacher is not an author, reading his own manuscript he is a Voice, a Fire, a Herald, bold and eager in his sacred work—an orator speaking in Heaven’s name and strength. There are more authors in the pulpit than preachers. Here is the weakness of the pulpit. It has become a competitor of the press, and has abandoned its special and incommunicable function.

Let us turn our eyes to our great Exemplar, the Lord Jesus Christ … Here, you see, is our pattern. But what resemblance do we bear to him? The leaving of all the glory of heaven, the taking of our nature with all its sinless infirmities, the dying under the weight of our sins, even of the sins of the whole world, were not too great acts of self-denial for him to perform; and that, too, even for his enemies. But we, what have we done? What have we suffered, for the glory of Christ, and the salvation of men? Say, whether we all have not reason to blush and be ashamed at our extreme want of conformity to him in these respects?

Salvation is undoubtedly all of grace. It is offered freely in the Gospel to the chief of sinners, without money and without price … But all who accept this great salvation, must prove the reality of their faith by carrying the cross after Christ. They must not think to enter heaven without trouble, pain, suffering, and conflict on earth. They must be content to take up the cross of doctrine, and the cross of practice,—the cross of holding a faith which the world despises, and the cross of living a life which the world ridicules as too strict and righteous overmuch. They must be willing to crucify the flesh, to mortify the deeds of the body, to fight daily with the devil, to come out from the world, and to lose their lives, if needful, for Christ’s sake and the Gospel’s.—These are hard sayings, but they admit of no evasion. The words of our Lord are plain and unmistakeable. If we will not carry the cross, we shall never wear the crown.

By all means, right life is the best in man’s prayer, for such life prays better to God than the voices of hypocrites.

Believers in Christ Jesus are saved. They are not looked upon as persons who are in a hopeful state and may ultimately be saved, but they are already saved … Every man and woman here is either saved at this present moment or lost, and that salvation is not a blessing to be enjoyed upon the dying bed and to be sung of in a future state above, but a matter to be obtained, received, promised and enjoyed now. God hath saved his saints, mark, not partly saved them, but perfectly saved them. The Christian is perfectly saved in God’s purpose; God has ordained him unto salvation, and that purpose is complete.

The hope of benefiting immortal souls is most delightful to a benevolent mind; and a successful issue to our labours is replete with joy. The disciple who was honoured with his Master’s love beyond all others, even he knew “no greater joy than to see his children walk in truth.” This accounts for the extreme earnestness with which St. Paul laboured for the salvation of men, and for their sake. He knew, that, even in the eternal world, it would augment his happiness to see that he had been instrumental in saving others; and that “he should rejoice in the day of Christ, when he found that he had not laboured in vain, or run in vain.” Indeed, so entirely was he swallowed up in the prosperity of his converts, that he was ready even to die for them, if need were; yea, and to welcome the most cruel death as a blessing, rather than to deprecate it as an evil, if only it might be subservient to the welfare of their souls.

For we must drive out by gentle encouragement his excessive timidity, which hinders him from expressing his opinion. We must temper his shyness by introducing the idea of brotherly fellowship. We must by questioning him find out whether he understands; and must give him confidence so that if he thinks there is an objection to make he may freely lay it before us. We must at the same time enquire of him whether he has ever heard these things before, and so perhaps they, as being things well-known and commonplace, fail to move him. We must then act in accordance with his answer, so as either to speak more clearly and simply, or to refute a contrary opinion, or not to set forth at greater length things that are familiar to him, but instead to give a brief summary of them, and to pick out some of those points that have been said mystically in the Sacred Scriptures, and particularly in the narration itself, the explanation and interpretation of which may make our discourse more agreeable. But if he is exceedingly slow-witted, and out of accord with and averse to every such inducement, we should bear with him in a compassionate spirit, and after briefly running through the other points, impress upon him in a way to inspire awe the truths that are most necessary concerning the unity of the Catholic Church, temptations, and the Christian manner of living in view of the future judgment; and we should rather say much on his behalf to God, than say much to him about God.

Behold here a broad foundation for the faith of a Christian! We are told in the Gospel to come to Jesus, to believe on Jesus, to live the life of faith in Jesus. We are encouraged to lean on Him, to cast all our care on Him, to repose all the weight of our souls on Him. We may do so without fear. He can bear all. He is a strong rock. He is Almighty. It was a fine saying of an old saint, ‘my faith can sleep sound on no other pillow than Christ’s omnipotence.’ He can give life to the dead. He can give power to the weak. He can ‘increase strength to them that have no might.’ Let us trust him, and not be afraid. The world is full of snares. Our hearts are weak. But with Jesus nothing is impossible.

The Gospel will come to the front and will prove that the wise are fools, and the fools are the wise, and that those who are called heretics are Christians, and those that call themselves Christians, heretics.

Thus there are two cities, one of the wicked, the other of the just, which to endure from the beginning of the human race even to the end of time, which are now intermingled in body, but separated in will, and which, moreover, are to be separated in body also on the day of judgment. For all men who love pride and temporal dominion together with empty vanity and display of presumption, and all spirits who set their affections on such things and seek their own glory by the subjection of man, are bound fast together in one fellowship; and even though they frequently fight one with another for these ends, still they are flung headlong by an equal weight of desire into the same abyss, and are united to one another by the likeness of their ways and deserts. And again, all men and all spirits who humbly seek God’s glory, not their own, and who follow Him in godliness, belong to one fellowship. And yet God is most merciful and long-suffering toward ungodly men, and offers them room for repentance and amendment.

But when the cause is added before us, and the mystery viewed aright, they will appear full of dignity, and matter for boasting. For it was that death which saved the world, when it was perishing. That death connected earth with heaven, that death destroyed the power of the devil, and made men angels, and sons of God: that death raised our nature to the kingly throne. Those chains were the conversion of many.

And the more so, the closer the friendship between them and us; for in proportion as we dwell in them through the bond of love, so do things which were old become new to us also.