The Upper Room: Being a Few Truths for the Times
By J. C. Ryle
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About this ebook
The volume now in the reader’s bands requires little introductory explanation. It contains a very miscellaneous selection of papers which I have sent forth from time to time, in one shape or another, during a forty-five years’ ministry. Some of these papers are not known beyond a small circle of kind friends. Not a few of them are the substance of pulpit addresses delivered on important public occasions, and composed with more than ordinary pains. All of them, I venture humbly to think, will be found to contain some useful truths for the times, and words in season.
I have reached an age when I cannot reasonably expect to write much more. There are many thoughts in this volume which I do not wish to leave behind me in the precarious form of separate single sermons, addresses, lectures, and tracts. I have therefore resolved to gather them together in the volume I now send forth, which I heartily pray God to bless, and to make it a permanent blessing to many souls.
Palace, Liverpool J. C. LIVERPOOL
1 December 1887
CrossReach Publications
J. C. Ryle
J. C. Ryle (1816–1900) was a prominent writer, preacher, and Anglican clergyman in nineteenth-century England. He is the author of the classic Expository Thoughts on the Gospels and retired as the bishop of Liverpool.
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The Upper Room - J. C. Ryle
I. They Went Up Into an Upper Room
11
Acts 1:13.
We are told in these simple words what the Apostles did immediately after the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven. Fresh from the wonderful and touching sight of their beloved Master being taken away from them,—with the message brought by angels, bidding them expect His Second Advent, still ringing in their ears.—they returned from Mount Olivet to Jerusalem, and went at once into an upper room.
Simple as the words are, they are full of suggestive thoughts, and deserve the close attention of all into whose hands this volume may fall.
Let us fix our eyes for a few minutes on the first place of meeting of Christians for worship of which we have any record. Let us examine the first congregation which assembled after the great Head of the Church had left the world, and left His people to themselves. Let us see who these first worshippers were, and how they behaved, and what they did. I venture to think that a little quiet contemplation of the subject may do us good.
This upper room,
we should remember, was the forerunner of every church and cathedral which has been reared in Christendom within the last eighteen centuries. St. Paul’s, and York, and Lincoln, and all the stately minsters of our own land; St. Sophia at Constantinople, St. Isaac at St. Petersburg, St. Stephen’s at Vienna, Notre Dame at Paris, St. Peter’s at Rome—all are descendants from this upper room.
Not one can trace its pedigree beyond that little chamber. Here it was that professing Christians, when left alone by their Master, first began to pray together, to worship, and to exhort one another. This room was the cradle of the infant Church of Christ, and the beginning of all our services. From this room the waters of the everlasting gospel first began to flow, which have now spread so widely throughout the world, however adulterated and corrupted they may have been in some ages and in some parts of the earth. I invite my readers, then, to come with me and examine this upper room as it appeared on Ascension day.
I. There are certain points arising naturally out of the text before us which appear to demand special notice. Let us see what they are.
Concerning the shape and size and form of this room, we know nothing at all. It was probably like many other upper rooms
in Jerusalem. But whether it was lofty, or low, or square, or round; whether it stood east and west, or north and south; whether it was ornamented or decorated or perfectly plain, we have not the slightest information, and the matter signifies very little. But it is a striking and noteworthy fact that in the original Greek it is called the upper room, and not an upper room, as our Authorized Version calls it. I venture to think that there is much in this. I believe there is the highest probability that this was the very room in which our Lord first appointed the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, and in which the Apostles first heard those well-known words, Take, eat; this is My body,
—Drink ye all of this, for this is My blood,
—those famous words which have been the cause of so much unhappy controversy with some, but the source of such mighty comfort to others.—I believe it was the same room in which the disciples were in the habit of abiding
during the fifty days between the Resurrection and Pentecost. Here, again, the original Greek helps us to a conclusion, if literally translated.—I believe it is the same room in which the disciples were assembled with the doors shut for fear of the Jews,
when the Lord Jesus suddenly appeared in the midst of them after His resurrection, and said, Peace be unto you: as My Father sent Me, so send I you;
and breathed on them, saying, Receive ye the Holy Ghost
(John 20:21, 22).—I believe it is the same room in which, a week afterwards, He appeared again, and rebuked the scepticism of doubting Thomas, saying, Be not faithless, but believing.
—I believe it is the same room in which our Lord appeared, and did eat before His disciples, and said, Handle Me, and see: a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see Me have
(Luke 24:39). On all these points I freely grant that I have nothing but conjectures to put before my readers. But they are conjectures which appear to me to be founded on the highest possible probability, and as such I think they demand our reverent consideration. But we may now turn boldly from conjectures, and look at things which are most plainly and unmistakably revealed.
(1) Let us then, first and foremost, look at the worshippers who were gathered together in this first place of Christian worship.
Peter was there, that warm-hearted, impulsive, but unstable Apostle, who, forty days before, denied his Master three times, and then repented with bitter tears, and who had been graciously raised by our Lord, and commanded to feed His sheep
(John 21:16, 17).
James was there, who had been the favoured companion of Peter and John on three important occasions, and who was the first of the Apostles to seal his faith with his blood, and drink of the cup which his Master drank (Matt. 20:23).
John was there, the other son of Zebedee, the beloved Apostle, whose head lay on our Lord’s breast at the Last Supper,—John, the first on the lake of Galilee, when our Lord appeared to the disciples as they were fishing, who cried out with instinctive love, It is the Lord,
—John, who at one time wished to call down fire from heaven on a village of the Samaritans, but lived to write three Epistles brimming over with love (John 21:7; Luke 9:54).
Andrew was there, the first of all the Apostles whose name we know, who followed Jesus after hearing the words, Behold the Lamb of God,
and then brought his brother Peter to Jesus, saying, We have found the Messias
(John 1:40, 41).
Philip of Bethsaida was there, the first Apostle to whom Jesus said, Follow Me,
—the Apostle who told Nathanael to come and see
the promised Messiah (John 1:43).
Thomas was there, who was once so desponding and weak in faith, but afterwards cried out with such grand Athanasian confidence, My Lord and my God
(John 20:28).
Bartholomew was there, who, by general consent, is the same as that very Nathanael who at first said, Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?
Yet this is he whom our Lord pronounced to be an Israelite without guile,
and who said, Thou art the Son of God, Thou art the King of Israel
(John 1:46–49).
Matthew the publican was there, who forsook his worldly calling at the bidding of our Lord, and sought lasting treasure in heaven, and who was afterwards privileged to hold the pen which wrote the first Gospel (Matt. 9:9).
James the son of Alphæus was there, who had the honour of being the presiding Apostle at the first Council held in Jerusalem, and of whom St. Paul tells the Galatians that, together with Peter and John, James was a pillar of the Church
(Gal. 2:9).
Simon Zelotes was there, of whom we know little certain except that he was also called the Canaanite,
and may possibly have lived at Cana of Galilee, and seen the first miracle our Lord worked. His name Zelotes seems to indicate that he was once a member of the famous Zealot party, a fierce advocate of Jewish home-rule, and an enemy of Roman supremacy. He was now zealous only for the kingdom of Christ.
Judas was there, the brother of James, called also Lebbæus or Thaddæus, the writer of the last Epistle in the New Testament, and the Apostle who asked the remarkable question, How is it that Thou wilt manifest Thyself unto us and not unto the world?
(John 14:22). In short, the whole company of the eleven faithful Apostles was assembled in that upper room.
On this occasion there were no absentees; and doubting Thomas was among the rest.
But there were others present beside the Apostles. The women
were there of whom some had long followed our Lord and ministered to His necessities, and been last at the Cross, and first at the tomb. I have little doubt that Mary Magdalene and Salome, and Susanna, and Joanna the wife of Chuza, Herod’s steward, formed part of the company (Luke 8:2, 3). And Mary the mother of Jesus was there, whom our Lord had committed to the special care of John; and where he was, she was sure to be. Truly the prophecy of old Simeon had been fulfilled in her case. The sword
of deep and keen sorrow had pierced through her soul
(Luke 2:35). For she was only flesh and blood, like any other woman. This is the last occasion on which her name appears in the pages of Holy Scripture. From henceforth she sinks out of sight, and all stories about her after-life are mere baseless traditions.
And, finally, our Lord’s brethren
were there. They were his cousins in all probability, or the sons of Joseph by a former marriage. Never let it be forgotten that at one time they did not believe on Jesus (John 7:5); but now their unbelief was gone, and they were true disciples, while Judas Iscariot had fallen away. The mention of them teaches the grand lesson that men may begin ill, and end well, and that many who now seem faithless may one day believe. So true it is that the last are sometimes first, and the first last.
Such was the congregation which assembled in the upper room
after the Ascension. Never, I suppose, has there been such a pure and spotless gathering of Christians from that day down to this. Never has there been, and probably never will be, such a near approach to the one Holy Catholic Church,
the mystical body of the Son of God, which is the blessed company of all faithful people.
Never has there been together so much wheat without tares, and such a singular proportion of grace, and penitence, and faith, and hope, and holiness, and love in one room together. Well would it be for the visible Church of Christ if all her assemblies were as free from unsound members, spots, and blemishes as the congregation which met together in the upper room.
(2) We should notice, secondly, the unity which characterized this first meeting in the upper room.
We are told expressly, that they were all there with one accord,
that is, of one mind. There were no divisions among them. They believed the same thing. They loved the same Person, and at present there was no disagreement among them. There was nothing of High, or Low, or Broad in that upper room.
Heresies, and strifes, and controversies were as yet unknown. Neither about baptism, or the Lord’s Supper, or vestments, or incense, was there any contention or agitation. Happy would it have been for Christendom if this blessed state of things had continued! At the end of eighteen centuries we all know, by bitter experience, that the divisions of Christians are the weakness of the Church, and the favourite argument of the world, the infidel, and the devil against revealed religion. Well may we pray, when we see this blessed picture of the upper room, that God would heal the many ecclesiastical diseases of the nineteenth century, and make Churchmen especially become more of one mind.
(3) We should notice, thirdly, the devotional habits of this first congregation in the upper room.
We are told expressly that they were continuing in prayer and supplication.
Here, again, we should mark the original Greek. The expression denotes that prayer was a continued and habitual practice at this crisis. What things these holy worshippers prayed for we are not told. Like our Lord’s discourse with the two Apostles journeying to Emmaus, one would like to know what their prayers were (Luke 24:27). We need not doubt that there was much prayer for grace to be faithful and not fall away,—for wisdom to do the thing that was right in the new and difficult position which they had to take up,—for courage, for patience, for unwearied zeal, for abiding recollection of our Lord’s example, our Lord’s teaching, and our Lord’s promises. But in perfect wisdom the Holy Ghost has thought fit to keep back these things from us, and we must not doubt that this is right. One thing, at any rate, is quite certain. We are taught clearly that nothing is such a primary duty of a Christian assembly as united prayer and supplication. Let us never forget the first charge which the great Apostle of the Gentiles gave to Timothy when he wrote to him about his duties as a minister of the Church, I exhort, therefore, first of all, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men; for kings and all that are in authority, that we may live a quiet and peaceable life
(1 Tim. 2:1, etc.). I dare to believe that the names of Annas, Caiaphas, and Pontius Pilate were not forgotten in the supplications and intercessions of the upper room.
(4) We should notice, lastly, the address given in this upper room by the Apostle Peter, on one of the ten days which elapsed between the Ascension and the day of Pentecost. It is an interesting fact that this is the first address which is recorded to have been given to any assembly of Christians after the Lord left the world. It is no less interesting that the first speaker was the Apostle Peter,—the very Apostle who, after denying his Master, had been mercifully raised again, and commanded to prove his love by feeding His sheep,—the very Apostle who had received a charge before his fall, When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren
(Luke 22:32). There was a peculiar fitness in Peter being the first to stand up and address the little company of one hundred and twenty names.
(a) Mark how he begins his address with a reverent reference to Holy Scripture. He puts down his foot firmly on the supremacy of God’s written Word as the Church’s rule of faith. He says, This scripture must needs have been fulfilled.
He says, It is written in the book of Psalms,
and takes a quotation for his text. Well and wisely does the late Dean Alford remark in his Homilies on the Acts: The first act of the Church by her first superintendent minister was an appeal to the text of Scripture. Let that never be forgotten. Would that every appeal by every one of her ministers since had been an appeal equally direct and equally justified!
(b) Mark, next, how Peter humbly acknowledges the liability of the highest and most privileged ministers of the Church to fall. He says of Judas Iscariot, He was numbered with us, and had obtained part of this ministry,
and then mentions his miserable end. He fell by transgression,
and then went to his own place.
Let that also never be forgotten. He lays down the grand principle, which should always be remembered in the Church, that no infallibility belongs to the ministerial office. A chosen Apostle of Christ fell sadly, and so also may any successor of the Apostles. Bishops, priests, and deacons may err, and have erred greatly, like Hophni, and Phinchas, and Annas, and Caiaphas, who were in direct succession to Aaron. We are never to suppose that ordained and consecrated men can make no mistakes. We are never to follow them blindly, or to believe as a matter of course that all they say is truth. The Bible is the only infallible guide.
(c) Mark, next, how he calls upon the Church to fill up the place which Judas had left vacant, and to choose one who might be numbered with the eleven Apostles. He speaks with unfaltering confidence, like one convinced that a work was beginning which the world and the devil could never stop, and that workmen must be appointed to carry it on in regular order. He speaks with a clear foresight of the battles the Church would have to fight, but with an evident conviction that they would not be fought in vain, and that the final issue was sure. He seems to say, Stand firm, though a standard-bearer has fallen away. Fill up the gap. Close up your ranks.
(d) Mark, lastly, how he winds up his address with a plain declaration of what a minister and successor of the Apostles ought to be. He was to be a witness of Christ’s resurrection.
He was to be a witness to the fact that the foundation of the Gospel is not a vague idea of God’s mercy, but an actual living Person, a Person who lived for us, died for us, and above all, rose again. Let that also never be forgotten. I affirm, without hesitation, that in these latter days we do not make enough of the resurrection of Christ. We certainly do not make as much of it as the Apostles did, judging from the Acts and the Epistles. When Paul went to Athens, we are told that he preached Jesus and the resurrection
(Acts 17:18). When he went to Corinth, one of the first truths he proclaimed was, that Christ rose again according to the Scriptures
(1 Cor. 15:4). When the same Paul was brought before Festus and Agrippa, Festus said that the complaint against him was about one Jesus who was dead, whom Paul affirmed to be alive
(Acts 25:19).
Let no one misunderstand my meaning. I do not say that we dwell too much on the sacrifice and the blood of Christ, but I do contend that we dwell too little on His resurrection. Yet our Lord Himself told the Jews more than once that the resurrection would prove Him to be the Messiah. St. Paul told the Romans, in the beginning of his Epistle, that Jesus was declared to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead
(Rom. 1:4). The resurrection completed the work of redemption, which our Lord came into the world to effect. It is written, that He was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification,
and the Corinthians are expressly told, If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins
(Rom. 4:25; 1 Cor. 15:17). In short, Christ’s resurrection is one of the grandest evidences of the truth of Christianity, a foundation proof that the salvation of sinners by the vicarious atonement is a finished work, and a miracle which the cleverest infidels have never been able to explain away. Until it is explained away, we need not be troubled by carping remarks about Balaam’s ass speaking, and Jonah in the whale’s belly. Well indeed would it have been for the Church if all her ministers had always been such as Peter recommended to be appointed, faithful witnesses
to a personal Christ, His death, and His resurrection.
So much for the upper room at Jerusalem, its congregation, their unity, their prayers, and the first address delivered within its walls. So much for the first prayer meeting, the first sermon, and the first corporate action of the professing Church of which we have any record. We need not doubt for a moment that the well-known promise of our Lord Jesus Christ was fulfilled in that room, Wheresoever two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them
(Matt. 18:20). The little company of worshippers did not see Him; but He was there.
II. Let me now try to draw some practical lessons for ourselves from the whole subject.
(1) In the first place, let us learn to be more thankful for the liberty of the days in which our lot is cast, and the wise toleration of the Government under which we live in this country. By the mercy of God, we enjoy great quietness.
We have no need to meet in upper rooms
with doors closed for fear of the Jews,
and with a constant feeling that there is but a step between us and a violent death. Men may build places of worship now, if they please, as costly and magnificent as the temple of Jerusalem itself, and no one jealously prohibits or interferes with them. We need not fear Roman Emperors, nor mediæval autocrats, nor Spanish Inquisitions. The land is before us, and men may build and worship as they please. I would to God that all wealthy laymen in this country would remember from whom riches come, and to whom they are indebted for their freedom and prosperity. I would to God that many more would honour Him with their substance, and come forward more frequently, saying, Let me build a Church for the service of God.
(2) In the next place, let us learn the source of true power in the Church. This little upper room was the starting-point of a movement which shook the Roman Empire, emptied the heathen temples, stopped gladiatorial combats, raised women to their true position, checked infanticide, created a new standard of morality, confounded the old Greek and Roman philosophers, and turned the world upside down. And what was the secret of this power? The unity, the soundness in the faith, the holiness, and the prayers and intercessions of the first professing Christians. Where these things are wanting, the grandest architecture and the most ornate ceremonial will do nothing to mend the world. It is the presence of Christ and the Holy Ghost which alone gives power.
(3) In the last place, let us pray for the Church of England, that she may continue faithful to the old truths which have done so much good for 300 years, truths which are embalmed in our Articles, Prayer Book, and Creeds. It is cheap and easy work to sneer at dogma, to scoff at inspiration and the atonement, to make merry at the controversies of Christians, and to tell us that no one really believes all the Bible, or all the facts enumerated in the Belief. It is easy, I repeat, to do this. Even children can cast mud, and throw stones, and make a noise. But sneers, and mud, and noise are not arguments. I challenge those who sneer at dogma to show us a more excellent way, to show us anything that does more good in the world than the old, old story of Christ dying for our sins, and rising again for our justification.
The man of science may say, Come with me, and look through my microscope or telescope, and I will show you things which Moses, David, and St. Paul never dreamed of. Do you expect me to believe what was written by ignorant fellows like them?
—But can this man of science show us anything through his microscope or telescope which will minister to a mind diseased, bind up the wounds of a broken heart, satisfy the wants of an aching conscience, supply comfort to the mourner over a lost husband, wife, or child? No, indeed! he can do nothing of the kind! Men and women are fearfully and wonderfully made. We are not made up merely of brains, and head, and intellect, and reason. We are frail, dying creatures, who have got hearts, and feelings, and consciences; and we live in a world of sorrow, and disappointment, and sickness, and death. And what can help us in a world like this? Certainly not science alone. Nothing can help us but the doctrine of that volume which some people call an old worn-out Jewish book, the Bible. None can help us but He who was laid in the manger of Bethlehem and died on the cross to pay our debt to God, and is now at God’s right hand. None but He who said, Come unto Me, all ye that labour, and I will give you rest
(Matt. 11:28). None but He who has thrown light on the grave, and the world beyond it, and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel and made a deeper mark on the world than all the men of science who have ever lived, from the times of Pythagoras, Aristotle, and Archimedes, down to Darwin and Huxley in the present day. Yes! I say again, let us pray that our Church may ever be faithful to her first principles, and never lend an ear to those plausible, eloquent apostles of free thought, who would fain persuade her to throw overboard her Creeds and Articles as useless lumber. Fine words and rhetorical fireworks will never satisfy humanity, check moral evil, or feed souls. Men would do well to read that striking paper which Miss Frances Power Cobbe wrote in the Contemporary Review for December 1884, and see what a ghastly world our world would be if it was a world without a faith or a creed. The age needs nothing new. It only needs the bold and steady proclamation of the old truths which were held in the upper room
at Jerusalem.
II. Luke, the Beloved Physician
21
Colossians 4:14.
There are two things in the title of this paper which I shall take for granted, and not dwell on them. One is, that Luke here mentioned is the same Luke who wrote the third Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles, and was the friend and companion of St. Paul. The other is, that Luke really was a physician of the body. On both these points the consent of learned men, who have a right to command our attention, is almost universal. I shall rigidly confine myself to two remarks which appear to grow out of the subject. For it is a significant fact, I think, that the great Apostle of the Gentiles, who was ever ministering to men’s souls, makes honourable mention of one who ministered to men’s bodies.
I. I remark then, for one thing, that one great feature of the Christian religion is the dignity and importance which it attaches to the human body.
Many readers of this paper need hardly be reminded that some of the schools of heathen philosophers regarded the body with contempt, as a hindrance and not a help, a clog and a drag and not an aid, to the soul. Even those nations which paid most attention to the burial of the body when dead, like the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, knew nothing of a future existence of the body after death, even at the most distant period. The heroes described by Homer and Virgil, in the Elysian Fields, the supposed place of happiness after death, were only ghosts and airy figures, with nothing material about them. When St. Paul, on Mars Hill, spoke of the resurrection of the dead,
we are told that some mocked
(Acts 17:32). Even Pliny, one of the most intelligent Latin writers, in his Natural History, says there were two things which were beyond the power of God,—one was to give immortality to mortals, and the other was to give bodily life again to the dead. (See Pearson on The Creed, vol. ii., p. 306, Oxford edition.)
Let us turn now to the Christian religion, and mark what a contrast it presents. Whether we look at its leading facts, or doctrines, or practical instructions for the present, or hopes for the future, the human body is continually brought to the front, and its importance magnified.
(a) Look, to begin with, at the great mysterious truth which lies at the foundation of our holy faith, the incarnation of Christ. When the Eternal Son of God came down into this sin-burdened world, to bring redemption, and change the whole condition of our fallen race, how did He come? Not as a mighty angel or a glorious spirit, as we might have expected. Nothing of the kind! He took on Him a bodily nature, just like our own, sin only excepted. He was born of a woman as an infant, and had a body that grew and increased in stature as our bodies do,—a body that could hunger and thirst, and be weary and need sleep, and feel pain, and groan in agony and suffering, like the body of any one who reads this paper. In that body He condescended to tabernacle for thirty-three years, its members daily fulfilling the Law of God perfectly, so that in His flesh
Satan could find nothing failing or defective (John 14:30).
(b) Look, in the next place, at the great cardinal doctrine of Christ’s atonement. That wondrous distinctive verity of our faith,—that solution of the problem, how can sinful man have peace with God?
—is indissolubly bound up with Christ’s body. It was the death of that body on the cross which provided for fallen man a way of reconciliation with God. It was the precious life-blood, which flowed from our Lord’s crucified body on Calvary, which purchased for us redemption from the curse of a broken law. In short, it is the blood of Christ’s body to which true Christians owe all their comfort while they live, and their hope when they die.
(c) Look, next, at the crowning facts of Christ’s resurrection and ascension into heaven. When our Lord came forth from the grave where Joseph and Nicodemus had laid Him, on the third day, He did not come forth as a spirit. To use the words of our Fourth Article, He "took again His body, with flesh, bones, and all things appertaining to the perfection of man’s nature." In that body He was seen and touched by His disciples. In that body He spoke, and ate, and drank like ourselves. And, finally, in that body He ascended into heaven, and there sits till He returns to judge all men at the last day. We have a priest and advocate with the Father who has a body.
(d) Look, next, at the practical precepts and exhortations which the Apostles are continually pressing on us in the New Testament. Mark how frequently they speak of the body and its members as instruments of righteousness,
as a part of the Christian’s nature requiring his constant care, and as a means of exhibiting his sanctification and holiness. Your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost.
—Glorify God in body and spirit, which are His.
—I pray God your whole spirit, and soul, and body, may be preserved blameless.
—Present your bodies a living sacrifice.
—Let Christ be magnified in my body.
—Let the life of Jesus be manifest in our mortal flesh.
—We shall receive the things done in the body.
—Where, indeed, and how, could the graces of temperance, soberness, chastity, and self-denial be shown forth except in and through the body? (Rom. 6:13; 1 Cor. 6:19, 20; 1 Thess. 5:23; Rom. 12:1; Phil. 1:20; 2 Cor. 4:11; 2 Cor. 5:10).
(e) Look, finally, at that grand distinctive hope which sustains the Christian amidst the deaths, and funerals, and pains, and partings, and sufferings of this world. That hope is the resurrection of the flesh after death. Our bodies shall live again. The grave cannot hold them. We part from those who fall asleep in Jesus in the blessed confidence that we shall meet and see them again, better, stronger, more beautiful than they ever were upon earth. For ever let us thank God that the glorious gospel which we profess to believe makes provision for our bodies as well as our souls.
But, after all, the importance which Christianity attaches to the body is not one whit greater than that which is continually attached to it by the children of this world. It is easy to sneer at the simple facts and doctrines of Christianity, and to talk great swelling words about mind,
and thought,
and intellect,
and reason.
But there is no getting over the broad fact that it is the body and not the mind, and the wants of the body, by which the world is governed.
Statesmen and politicians know this full well, and often to their cost. Their tenure of office depends in great measure on the contentment of the people. And who does not know that nothing creates popular discontent so much as high prices of corn, and general dearness of food for the body?
Merchants and shipowners, of all men in the world, ought to know the importance of the body. Corn, and meat, and sugar, and tea, to feed the body,—cotton and wool to clothe the body,—what are these but the very articles which create the main portion of the commerce, and carrying trade, and business of a nation?
It would be waste of time to multiply arguments on this subject. In the face of such facts as these, it is the highest wisdom, both in the Church and the State, never to forget the importance of the body. To promote cleanliness, and temperance, and social purity,—to aim at the highest standard of sanitary arrangements,—to encourage every movement which can increase the health and longevity of a people,—to provide as far as possible good air, good water, good dwellings, and cheap food for every man, woman, and child in the land,—these are objects which deserve the best attention both of the Christian and the man of the world.
There is a mine of deep truth in the saying, "Sanitas sanitatum: omnia sanitas." Whatever students and bookworms and philosophers may please to say, there is an indissoluble connection between the bodies and minds and souls of mankind. You cannot separate them. Not one of the three can be safely neglected. The Church, which only cares for saving souls, and the State, which only cares for educating minds, are both making a vast mistake. Happy is that country where body, soul, and mind are all cared for, and a continual effort made to provide for the health of all three.
II. The other remark which I wish to make is this: Observe the honour which our Lord Jesus Christ has put on the medical profession.
It is a noteworthy fact, to begin with, that one of the four men whom our Lord chose to write the Gospels was a physician.
Not only does ecclesiastical history, with almost entire harmony, tell us this, but there is strong internal evidence in St. Luke’s writings to confirm it. An ingenious writer has lately published a book which proves that many Greek phrases and expressions used in the third Gospel and the Acts are thoroughly medical, and such as a physician of that age would use in describing the symptoms of disease, or of returning health. In short, there is little room for doubt that out of the twenty-seven books which make up the little volume of the New Testament, two of the longest come from the pen of a medical man.
But, after all, there is another fact of even deeper significance which demands attention. I refer to the very large number of the cases of sickness and disease which our Lord Jesus Christ was pleased to heal during the period of His earthly ministry. No doubt, if He had thought fit, He could have shown His Divine power, and proved His Divine mission, by miracles like the plagues of Egypt, by calling fire from heaven like Elijah, by causing the earth to open and swallow up His enemies, as Dathan and Abiram were swallowed up in the wilderness. But He did not do so. The great majority of His wondrous works were works of mercy wrought on the suffering bodies of men and women. To cure the leprous, the dropsical, the palsied, the fevered, the lame, the blind, was the continual labour of love of Him who was God manifest in the flesh.
To use the deep and mysterious words quoted from Isaiah by St. Matthew, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses
(Matt. 8:17).
Now why was this? Why did our Lord adopt this line of action, and habitually condescend to devote time and attention to the humbling and often loathsome ills to which flesh is heir? Partly, I believe, to remind us that He came to remedy the fall of man; and that of all the consequences of the fall, none cause so much trouble, and affect all ranks and classes of society so thoroughly, as sickness. But partly also, I believe, to teach Christians in every age, that to minister to the sick is eminently a work of mercy according to Christ’s mind. He that endeavours to check disease, to alleviate suffering, to lessen pain, to help the self-curative powers of nature, and to lengthen life, may surely take comfort in the thought, that, however much he may fail, he is at any rate walking in the footsteps of Jesus of Nazareth. Next to the office of him who ministers to men’s souls, there is none really more useful and honourable than that of him who ministers to the soul’s frail tabernacle—the body.
He that thinks of these things will not wonder that the rise and progress of Christianity in every age has done much for the office of the physician. That nothing was known of medicine or surgery before the Christian era, it would be unfair to say. The names of Podalirius and Machaon in Homer, the better-known, less mythical name of Hippocrates (no mean observer of symptoms), are familiar to students. But it is a certain fact that the sick were never so systematically cared for, and the medical profession so honourably esteemed, as they have been since the Church of Christ leavened the world. The builders of the Parthenon and Colosseum built no infirmaries. You will find no ruins of hospitals at Athens or Rome. The infidel, the sceptic, and the agnostic may sneer at Bible religion if they please, but they cannot get over the fact that medical and surgical knowledge have always advanced side by side with the gospel of Christ. Clever and ingenious as the heathen inhabitants of India, China, and Japan are at this day, it is notorious that their acquaintance with anatomy and materia medica, and their treatment of bodily diseases, are beneath contempt.
Few of us, perhaps, realize what an immense debt we owe in Christian England to the medical profession. How much the comfort of our lives depends on it, and how vastly different is the condition of those whose lot is cast in a heathen country, or an uncivilized back settlement of a colony! He that has a good servant in his house, and a good doctor within reach, ought to be a thankful man.
Fewer still, I believe, realize what enormous strides medicine and surgery have made in the last two centuries, and are continually making in the present. Of course death still reigns, and will reign until Christ returns in glory. Kings and their subjects, rich and poor, all alike die, and will die until death is swallowed up in victory. And no marvel! The human body is a frail and delicate machine. Strange that a harp of a thousand strings should keep in tune so long.
But that the duration of life in this age is greatly increased by the advance of medical science, and that many diseases are preventible, manageable, or curable, which were once always thought fatal, are facts entirely beyond dispute. Let any one read Baxter’s semi-medical sermon in the Morning Exercises, and observe his receipts for hypochondria and dyspepsia, and then say whether he ought not to be thankful that he lives in the nineteenth century. The mere fact that our ancestors knew nothing of quinine, chloroform, vaccination, the carbolic spray, the stethoscope, the laryngoscope, the ophthalmoscope, or the right treatment of the lunatic, the idiot, the deaf and dumb, and the blind, is a fact that speaks volumes to any intelligent mind.
None, perhaps, have such constant opportunities of seeing the value of a medical man’s services as Christian ministers. We meet them in sick-rooms, and by the side of death-beds, and we know the self-denying labour which their profession entails, and the ungrudging and often unpaid attention which the sick almost invariably receive at their hands.
There ought always to be the utmost harmony and friendly feeling between the two professions. The sick-room is the common ground on which they meet. On that ground they can greatly help one another. I think the minister of religion can help the medical man by teaching his patients the paramount importance of obedience to orders, of submission to advice, of attention to rules about diet and sanitary matters, and by encouraging patience and quietness of spirit. I am sure the doctor can help the minister by gently and wisely reminding those whose cases are past recovery, that it is their duty to accept the inevitable, that this life is not all, that they have souls as well as bodies, and that it is wise to look calmly at their latter end, and a world to come, and to prepare to meet God.
There is much in common in the two professions, the one in caring for men’s bodies, and the other in caring for men’s souls. We ministers cannot command success. Too often we visit in vain, exhort in vain, advise in vain, preach in vain. We find that spiritual life and death are in higher hands than ours. The doctor finds that under the most skilful treatment people will die, and we find that under the most faithful teaching many continue unmoved in conscience, and dead in sins. Like the doctor, we often feel our ignorance, cannot diagnose or discern symptoms, and feel doubtful what to say. Both ministers and medical men have great need to be clothed with humility. But I trust, to use the words which were placed on the tomb of Sir Henry Lawrence, we both try to do our duty,
and persevere. Duties are ours, but events are God’s.
That there never may be wanting in Great Britain a continual supply of able, right-minded, faithful medical men, and that we who minister to the soul, and those who minister to the body, may always work harmoniously together, and help one another, is my earnest prayer.
III. Simplicity in Preaching
31
King Solomon says, in the book of Ecclesiastes, Of making many books there is no end
(Eccles. 12:12). There are few subjects about which that saying is more true than that of preaching. The volumes which have been written in order to show ministers how to preach are enough to make a small library. In sending forth one more little treatise, I only propose to touch one branch of the subject. I do not pretend to consider what should be the substance and matter of a sermon. I purposely leave alone such points as gravity, unction, liveliness, warmth,
and the like, or the comparative merits of written or extempore sermons. I wish to confine myself to one point, which receives far less attention than it deserves. That point is simplicity in language and style.
I ought to be able to tell my readers something about simplicity,
if experience will give any help. I began preaching forty-five years ago, when I first took orders in a poor rural parish, and a great portion of my ministerial life has been spent in preaching to labourers and farmers. I know the enormous difficulty of preaching to such hearers, of making them understand one’s meaning, and securing their attention. So far as concerns language and composition, I deliberately say that I would rather preach before the University at Oxford or Cambridge, or the Temple, or Lincoln’s Inn, or the Houses of Parliament, than I would address an agricultural congregation on a fine hot afternoon in the month of August. I have heard of a labourer who enjoyed Sunday more than any other day in the week,—Because
he said, I sit comfortably in church, put up my legs, have nothing to think about, and just go to sleep.
Some of my younger friends in the ministry may some day be called to preach to such congregations as I have had, and I shall be glad if they can profit by my experience.
Before entering on the subject, I wish to clear the way by making four prefatory remarks.
(a) For one thing, I ask all my readers to