THE DAILY PURIFYING. 329 weakness and errors and mistakes-as often upon the positive sins of the day, a Christian man may pause to ask himself whether he indeed belongs to the little flock, or whether he does not more fitly find his place in the world that lieth in wickedness. He is quite right in any measure of repentance and rebuke. But if beyond this he goes still further, and, in moody despondency, imagines that he has forfeited his stake in Christ, then, thank God, he is quite mistaken. Though the child may wander from the father, yet the relationship is not destroyed-the son is still the son, and, with repentance and confession, may still cry, Abba, Father. Our blessed Saviour, as it were, has considered the needs of our frailty, and has made provision for such. The same prayer that tells us to ask for our daily bread bids us pray, "forgive us our trespasses." The same Lord who makes his disciples clean every whit, tells them also that they need to wash their feet. Evermore there is the fountain open for sin and for uncleanness, in which we may wash and be clean. From day to day our feet will be soiled by the inevitable contact with the earth. By the feet is signified "the lower nature, in the constant necessity of a renewal unto holiness" (Meyer). The hands may be pure, the heart cleansed, the brow uplifted to heaven; but while we are in the world there must be perpetual sinfulness, and therefore a perpetual repentance and a perpetual cleansing. How much more is this cleansing necessary if we have forgotten 330 HERBERT'S CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE. that we have been purged from old sins (2 Pet. i. 9), and have returned to them again! Now look at that beautiful poem of George Herbert's, "The Flower," for which Coleridge entertained an especial affection, and which is so peculiarly full, as are all Herbert's poems, of Christian experience. In that noble religious literature which so nourishes the Christian life, there are hardly any writings so fraught with instruction and consolation as those of Herbert. How aptly do Herbert's lines recall the experience of so many of us! The heart has become darkened in heavenly things, callous, hardened, worldly; the sense of distance is interposed between the soul and God, which we feel we cannot of ourselves bridge over. But, in the great mercy of God, light has broken through the cloud, and peace has once more brooded on the disquieted heart. "How fresh, O Lord, how sweet and clean Are Thy returns! ev'n as the flowers in spring; Who would have thought my shrivell❜d heart To see their mother-root, when they have blown; These are Thy wonders, Lord of power! Fast in Thy Paradise, where no flow'r can wither! Off'ring at heaven, growing and groaning thither: THE FLOWER. Nor doth my flower Want a spring-shower; My sins and I joining together. And now in age I bud again: That I am he On whom Thy tempests fell all night!, These are Thy wonders, Lord of love! 331 320 THE EVIL OF THE DAY. faith we are enabled to cast the burden on the Lord. No man rich in this world's goods should rely on them, for the Lord who gave can take them away: no one who wants them should despair, because God can give them too, if there should really be such need. "The Lord is my portion, saith my soul." From many lives these temporal cares are wellnigh wholly eliminated. But, none the less, the "evil" belongs to the day, and it may even be in an aggravated shape. Cark and care, anxiety and unrest, belong to each life, and there are many grounds for believing that they are absolutely necessary to each life. No suffering can be more painful than when illness and death are in our homes, and from this deepest suffering no lot in life is exempt. But here the divine help will assuage, modify, or abolish our cares. These cares will work out our sanctification. They will be overruled to our real good. They are the good seed which we now bear weeping, but, doubtless, "we shall come again with joy, and bring our sheaves with us. We must look forward to that harvest which is the end of the world, and the reapers the angels. As our day is, so shall our strength be, and there is encouragement here as we proceed from day to day; because, although we know not what a day may bring forth, we know it can bring forth nothing for which the divine strength shall not prove sufficient. 2. Taking up the cross. This, above all else, is TAKING UP THE CROSS. 321 God our work from day to day. "If any man will be My disciple, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me." What are we to understand by this daily taking up of the cross? In the experience of most men, it will be found that there is a very real sense in which the words are true. has so ordained that much pain, much sacrifice, much self-denial, is generally involved with the patient and punctual discharge of duty. This may not be the case with the daily discharge of the avocations of life, for a certain pleasure and contentment are to be found herein, and here, only too often, men find their rest. But there are duties of a higher kind which may give us great pain and unhappiness. A fruitful case of confusion of thought has often occurred. Because God has enjoined that to which pain is often annexed, men have supposed that pain is in itself a good, and have indulged in mortification and austerity in the belief that mortification and austerity are of themselves well pleasing in the sight of God. For this extreme view, which has caused so much that is simply and grotesquely horrible, much that must have fatally obscured the divine truth of the fatherhood and the love of God, we see no warrant in Holy Writ. If our Heavenly Father sees that pain is good for us, He will certainly send it; there is no need that we should presumptuously bring it upon ourselves. Let us with a cheerful heart take the good which God gives; patiently awaiting and acquiescing in His good pleasure, |