Here was But after the fire came a still small voice. that which he must own; which his heart confesses to be its master: here was that which was really appalling. The LORD was in this, and the prophet, who could not be moved by that rage of the elements, "covered his head with his mantle, and went out, and stood at the entering in of the cave." The lesson was complete. He had been taught what Power is not, and what it is; he had been cured of his craving for that power which shall rend rocks in pieces, and he had been taught to prize his weakness; he had been shown what kind of strength it is which might come forth through that weakness to move his fellow-men. And, dear brethren, we, every one of us, though we may not be prophets, and may have no strange work committed to us, must by some process or other have this truth driven home to our hearts. In all of us there is this coveting of power; this misunderstanding of its true nature; this restless craving for external exhibitions of it; the vain hope, that if we could see them or produce them, we should be affected ourselves or should affect others. And then comes the idolatry of that which carries with it the external symbols and tokens of power, drawing us away from the worship of that which indeed possesses it. We are hurried into violent impatient efforts of our own to accomplish that which God would accomplish by His silent and mysterious methods; we invent a way for ourselves, instead of yielding ourselves to be His servants and to do His will. Have you not tried sometimes to gather about yourselves greater and more terrible evidences of the reality of GOD's word and threatenings; have you not thought that if you could see them set before your eyes in some terrific external manifestation, even in some vivid image or dream, you would not then treat them as heedlessly as you now do; they would not all pass by you as if they signified nothing? Have you not said to yourself, I should like to see on every road side some reminiscence of the divine power and the divine holiness, that would shake me out of my forgetfulness, and make me feel that heaven and hell are not merely phantoms of my mind? Brethren, we must cast away such thoughts, they are idle and will deceive us. Not pictures and signs merely of the fire, wind, and earthquake which betoken that the LORD is passing by, might be gazed at with our eyes, but the actual wind, fire, and earthquake might be felt by us, and yet our hearts remain just as unmoved as they were. We might live, how many thousands have lived, amidst the horrors of a besieged city, through the whirlwind of a great revolution which shakes kingdoms and empires to their centre, and be just as light and vain after as before it. We may see (alas! how many ministers of CHRIST know this,) daily spectacles of death, bodily and spiritual; it may be our business, our vocation to converse with such spectacles; and we may have the most appalling inward assurance that they are incapable of working any habitual awe or sympathy in us. And if it is ever otherwise, if ever the sight of GOD's hand stretched out does lead us to a better, truer state of mind, it is because we have heard the still small voice speaking through them, interpreting the sense of them. If you look back upon your lives, if you recollect the most memorable and sad passages of them, you will find that it has always been so. Calamities the most overwhelming to yourselves, the most crushing to all about you, were useful just so far as they led you to listen for this voice, and to ask that it might reach you because nothing else could. Outward events affect us only by driving us away from themselves, by forcing us to seek the unseen LORD of the heart and spirit. Has it not been the same also in your dealings with your brethren? Have you not oftentimes hoped to overthrow them with some blast of rhetoric or argument? Have you not wondered that they were not swept away by it? But the LORD was not in that wind. Have not you then tried to shake their very souls by an awful exhibition of the consequences of the acts and opinions which you disapproved? They were moved, perhaps, at the moment, but only the more fixed in their courses afterwards, for the LORD was not in that earthquake. Vehement passion, denunciation, persecution remained; you tried them; they too failed; the LORD was not in that fire. Have not you then sometimes been astonished, even mortified, to find that a few plain words, a simple assertion of faith, by a humble person who knew nothing of argument, the kind loving act of some one who had no vehement words at command, has touched the hard heart, and opened the fountains of tears which had seemed for ever dry? The still small voice was there, and the LORD was in it. Surely, brethren, this experience may be a great help to us in understanding GOD's words, and all the course of his dealings with us. "Not by might nor power, but by my spirit," is the truth He is teaching us everywhere. Only do not let us pervert that doctrine into the notion that we are to lie sick and dying beside the healing pool, until some angel goes down and troubles it. There is one ever near us who is saying, "Rise up and walk," who is giving us those energies which we have not in ourselves; or who, if He crushes our energies for a time, only does it that we may know where the secret of them lies. Since He took flesh and dwelt among us; since He shewed forth power in weakness, we must expect to find his servants fitted for any work that He appoints for them by the like process. They must be taught to hear the still small voice saying to them, "This is the way, walk ye in it," by the experience of their own ignorance, and confusions, and self-will; they must be taught not to drown that voice in their own; not to think that they can make it more audible to others by their cries and shrieks; to learn that the wrath of man does not work the righteousness of GOD,-that the quietest means are the mightiest, that the false prophets cry and cut themselves with stones,-that the true one merely draws nigh at the time of the evening sacrifice, and asks the LORD GOD of Israel to turn the heart of his people back again; that the meekest prayer is most likely to call the fire from heaven;-that gentle and loving acts are the best witnesses for the GOD of love. To learn this thoroughly and practically is slow and hard work; but it must be learnt, and GOD himself is our teacher in it. If we will submit to be guided by His spirit, to work in His way, He will complete the lesson in us as He did in His prophet of old; and then when the day of his manifestation comes, though the rocks may, be rent and the earth may quake, and the fire may destroy all that is corrupt, it will not be these things that will move us; it will be the vision of Him whom we have been waiting for, it will be His still small voice, saying to every trusting spirit, "Enter thou into the joy of thy LORD." INDEX TO SERMONS IN THIS SERIES, FOR SUNDAYS AND FESTIVALS. Fage I. 17 ADVENT. Deuteronomy xi. 12. By the Hon, and Very Rev. II. 177 EPIPHANY. St. John xii. 35. By the Rev. FRANCIS MINDEN I. 475 FIRST SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY. St. Matthew ii. 2. By the I. 27 By the FIRST SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY. St. Luke ii. 51. III. 59 By the III. 17 FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY. Colossians iii. 16. I. 238 shire I. 157 VOL. III. 2 I |