CHAPTER III.

THE THIRD SUNDAY IN ADVENT.

Lord Jesu Christ, who at thy first coming didst send thy messenger to prepare thy way before thee; Grant that the ministers and stewards of thy mysteries may likewise so prepare and make ready thy way, by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, that at thy second coming to judge the world we may be found an acceptable people in thy sight, who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Spirit, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

THIS is the first of four Collects, which were drawn up in connexion with the Savoy Conference in 1661, the other three being the Collects for St. Stephen's Day, for the sixth Sunday after the Epiphany, and for Easter Even. A glance at these four prayers shows that they are all struck from the same die, and that the author (probably it was Cosin, Bishop of Durham; at all events his name stood at the head of the Commission appointed to revise the Book of Common Prayer)1 followed as his model rather the Collects framed at the Reformation in 1549 than those of the early Office books. These Collects, like those of the Reformation, are longer and fuller than the earlier ones; unity of idea is not so much studied in them; all of them cite the words of Holy Scripture, instead of making covert allusions to it. In asserting this, however, I would by no means be understood to disparage the earlier Collects. It is quite possible to quote Scripture glibly 'See the names of the Committee above. Book I. Chap. IX. p. 65, note 1.

and readily without having any real knowledge of it. Sunday-school children are too often an example of this. They can say off by rote a hundred texts, to not one of which have they given a moment's thought. The sound of the text is in their ears, but the sense of it is not in their minds. And, on the other hand, it may happen (and no doubt it was so with the early Collect writers, judging from the evidence which their Collects furnish), that a man's mind shall be so saturated with the sentiments of Scripture that, without directly using Bible phrases, he suggests to a well-instructed reader of what he writes several passages of God's inspired Word.1 And this is what the primitive prayer-writers do. They do not repro

1 In confirmation of this I quote an author, with whom in this point 1 entirely concur; while on most other theological subjects I must not only disavow, but earnestly repudiate, the views he has thought it right to put forth :

"I take the second Collect, for Peace-'O God, who art the author of peace and lover of concord, in knowledge of whom standeth our eternal life, whose service is perfect freedom-' I need go no further; what strikes me as the common characteristic of all the prayers is here-how unconsciously full they are of the Bible, and of the best parts of the Bible. I will only point out this one characteristic in this one prayer: 'O God, who art the author of peace.' Now 'peace' occurs no less than twelve times in the Epistles of St. Paul in a similar connexion; and if there is one word associated more than another with the thought of God in the New Testament, it is that of peace. Now, I venture to say that the people who wrote this, 'O God, who art the author of peace,' never thought of any particular text at all, but were simply impregnated with certain powerful characteristics of Bible thought, and when they spoke of God their first idea was that He gave peace to the storm-tossed, and wretched, and worn out with care; truce to the strife of fightings within, and truce to fightings without. He was the Author of peace and Lover of concord. He made men 'to be of one mind in a house.' 'He was the God of peace who bruised Satan under their feet,' 'the very God of peace who sanctified them wholly,' 'the God of peace that brought again from the dead the Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep,' 'the Author of peace and the Lover of concord!'"

Rev. H. R. Haweis's "Speech in Season" [London, 1874], pp. 145, 146.

duce Scripture verbally, but after digesting it and passing it through the alembic of their own minds.

"1

Our Collect was substituted by Cosin and his colleagues for a much shorter and quite unobjectionable one, in which our Lord was besought to "give ear to our prayers," and "by" His "gracious visitation" to "lighten the darkness of our heart.' The great merit of the new Collect is that it introduces a new idea, which is not only most valuable in itself, but also carries on, and beautifully dovetails in with, the train of thought which runs through the series of Advent Collects. In the first Collect we

pray God to give us grace to prepare ourselves for the dawn of the Second Advent on this benighted world, in the way prescribed in His Word, "by casting away the works of darkness and putting upon us the armour of light."2 But if we would make this preparation successfully, we must use the means which God gives us of making it. The first means is Holy Scripture, which, rightly used, will fortify us with patience until the Advent, and give us comfort in the hope of its appearing. This, therefore, is the subject of the second Collect. And what other means are given us of preparing for the second Advent? The Christian ministry rightly exercised; to which, moreover, our thoughts are drawn by the fact that the third week in Advent is an Ember week, in preparation for the fourth Sunday, on which Holy Orders are

1 Here is the Collect with the original of which it is a translation :— Translation in King Edward's

Sarum Missal.

Aurem tuam, quæsumus, Domine, precibus nostris accommoda: et mentis nostræ tenebras gratiâ tuæ visitationis illustra. Per Dominum.

first Prayer Book (1549).

Lord, we beseech thee, give ear to our prayers, and by thy gracious visitation lighten the darkness of our heart, by our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 See Rom. xiii. 12.

administered, and labourers sent forth into the Lord's vineyard. This, then, is the great fundamental thought of the third Collect, that one means of preparing for the Second Advent is the Christian ministry rightly exercised, as another is the Holy Scriptures rightly used.

But another grand and most edifying idea is embodied in this Collect. I doubt not it was an idea thrown out by some of the old theologians long before Cosin's time, though I do not know in the writings of which of the Fathers it first made its appearance. The idea is that Christian ministers are called to be pioneers of the Second Advent, clearing the way, and preparing the minds of the people for the Lord's appearing in glorious majesty, as St. John the Baptist cleared the way for His appearing in great humility. It is a great thought indeed, and opens out several important and edifying views of the ministerial office, and of the spirit in which it should be exercised. For nothing was St. John the Baptist more remarkable than for putting Christ forward, while he himself retired into the shade. He claimed only to be an index-finger pointing to the atoning Lamb of God—nothing more for a moment. When he was asked, "What sayest thou of thyself?" he said, "I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness." I am a voice. I am a voice. A voice offers nothing to the eye, nothing to look upon; it is merely an articulate sound, conveying an idea to the understanding, giving a notice, or an instruction, or a direction, or a warning. John never professed to be anything more. He pointed out Christ to his disciples as "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world; "2 and when those who heard him speak followed Jesus, and conversed with Him, John's function to them was at an end. They had been

1 St. John i. 22, 23.

2 See St. John i. 29, 36.

St.

led to the Bridegroom of souls by John's ministry; and thenceforth John, who had previously been an indexfinger and a voice, fell back into the relation of the Bridegroom's friend, one who stood and heard Him, and rejoiced greatly at the sound of His voice.1 And such, too, should be the character of Christian ministers; they should fasten the minds and hearts of the people on their Master and not on themselves. "We preach not ourselves," says St. Paul, "but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake."2 This text, indeed, is not cited in the Collect, but another text is, which, when viewed in connexion with its context, conveys a similar estimate of the ministerial office. "Grant," it is said, "that the ministers and stewards of thy mysteries." Now pray observe the connexion in which those words occur in the First Epistle to the Corinthians. Paul is not in that passage magnifying his office, or exalting its prerogatives and dignities. On the contrary, he is inculcating upon the Corinthians not to "glory in men,"3 not to" think of" any ministers of Christ (even though inspired) "above that which is written." Paul, and Apollos, and Cephas, he says, are nothing more than instruments to bring people to Christ, and through Christ to God;—“ let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ; the stress should be laid on the word ministers, which, according to the derivation of the Greek word in the original, means a rower in a galley, who takes the time from an officer appointed to give it, and receives his orders from the captain of the ship. "We, Christian ministers," he would say, are only rowers in the Church's galley; our Captain who gives us our orders, our Officer who gives us

1 See St. John iii. 29. See 1 Cor. iv. 6.

VOL. I.