The Christian Life: Its Course, Its Hindrances, and Its HelpsArnold, Thomas
Religion
The Christian Life: Its Course, Its Hindrances, and Its Helps
Arnold, Thomas
Christian life; Sermons, English
Now, Christ's Church, the living temple of the Holy Ghost, puts in the
place of this natural and corrupt man, whose witness is against God,
another sort of man, redeemed and regenerate, whose whole being breathes
a perpetual witness of God. Consider, again, what we should see in such
a Church. We should see a beginning, a middle, but the end is not yet
visible; we should see, besides the faculties for knowledge and
enjoyment which were receiving their gratification daily, other
faculties of both kinds, whose gratification was as yet withheld; we
should see desires not limited to any object now visible or attainable.
We should see death looked to as the gate by which these hitherto
unobtained objects were to be sought for; and we should hear it spoken
of, not as the greatest of evils, but as an event solemn, indeed, and
painful to nature, but full of blessing and of happiness. We should see
love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness,
temperance; a constitution of nature as manifestly proclaiming its
author to be the God of all holiness and loving-kindness, as the
wonderful structure of our eyes or hands declares them to be the work of
the God of all wisdom and power. We should thus see in all our
fellow-men, not only as much, but far more than in the constitution of
the lower animals, or of the plants, or of the heavenly bodies, a
witness of God and of eternity. Their whole lives would be a witness;
their whole conversation would be a witness; their outward and more
peculiar acts of worship would then bear their part in harmony with all
the rest. Every day would the voices of the Church be heard in its
services of prayer and thanksgiving; every day would its members renew
their pledges of faithfulness to Christ, and to one another, upon
partaking together the memorials of his sacrifice.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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