The World's Great Sermons, Volume 07: Hale to Farrar
Religion
The World's Great Sermons, Volume 07: Hale to Farrar
Sermons
We question again about money. What proportion of our property
should we devote to God? The Jews said one-tenth. Can we do no
better, after so long a time? Let us give the whole, and if by any
means we can compass it, let us add another tenth, simply to show
what a delight it is to give all things to Him, and to let Him make
the allotment in His care for us, and for our household, and for the
Church, and for the wide world that we are living in. There are many
who do this, and they learn how true is that word of Christ that is
called to mind among the Acts of the Apostles, "It is more blessed
to give than to receive."
Thus, in all things let us make the way of God our own, become His
children entirely, receive the love of Christ in its fulness, make
up our own life in His name, according to the largeness of His
thought. If we will consent to it, we can be great and rich and
strong. It seems strange to say that we are not ready to be blest,
but of many it is true. They are not willing to be greatly blest, to
have the cup run over. They are willing to be useful, but not very
useful. They ask to be set in His service, but when He takes their
word and breathes His own desire into it, they shrink back. It is a
very serious thing, if we are able to perceive it, to consent that
God should bless us as He pleases, should have His own estimate of
our character, His own measure of our powers, His own vision of our
accomplishment, and should call us to greater service, to diviner
employment, than we have ever dreamed of. It was a wise woman who
said, "I have had to face my own prayers." We face our prayers when
God gives His own wish to our words, and makes them large enough
to hold His thoughts. It is one of the hardest things to believe,
but one to which, in humbleness of mind and in a faith which will
not falter, we should consent,--that high word of calling and
consecration which Christ gave more than once,--"As the Father hath
sent me into the world, even so send I you." Not our thought but His
thought makes our calling, and the thought of God is the summons and
the guidance of our life. Even so, even according to Thy greatness,
and Thy gentleness which makes men great; Thine infinite purposes,
and Thine eternal grace; even so, O Lord of mercy and of truth, send
us into the world!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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