IT The thing that we dread is often the thing that brings God near. * He is sometimes a theory and His comfort a poem, until darkness and solitude cause the soul to call out for Him. And I am giving the experience of some also when I say it. was in the trouble into which sin plunged us that God first became a reality. It was then that we sought, and cried passionately, and found. There comog a shadow that np eai;thly light can pierce, and into it comes, the light of God; and we have to bless the solitude and the darkness and the bitter penalty and consequence, because then, for the firsttime, God became real and near.*
III.
The House op God and the Gate of Heaven.
This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.
Let us pass at once from the story of Jacob and consider what lessons these words can bring us when they are used of a sacred building, a church. The_yigion of th^ patriarch reveals, to us
'J. 0. Lambert 'C. Brown.
GENESIS xxvm. i6, 17 225
that the whole, eajrth is the House ql God, while padafiiilar places -ji are j^osea to emphasize the truth that therfi^is now^ajjontiimous iijleioourse betsxeen earth and heaven, that already, we..ara.liYiiig iiLa spiritual world. Three lessons each Church presses upon us, and our life is hallowed and strengthened by remembering them.
1. A.JJbat^'chjmtriesses to the universaLpreseTice.of Cfod.—ThiB universal presence of God is a most certain truth; yet for the most part our eyes are holden that we should not know it. We are unable to grasp the fulness of the fact. And therefore God meets our infirmity. In.. His love^He gives us fligns. He has been -pleased from the earliest times to set. His name here,and thjere»-iii a stone, ag_§.t_Bet]i=el, in a tent, in^a. temple, and now in ^ SLChuxch. ThrQugh the visible. He h>elps_u3 to see the ..invisible, (f?^ A Church, then^does not bring to us anything new. or .exceptional. It witnesses Jlo the unseen, the, spiritual, the eternal, which is about us pn..^eyery side. Ijb shows G:od tQ..u8 here because He is evgiywhere. It helps us to see whatjies beyond the shadows on wbich we look. It encourages us ta-pierqt .beneath the surface tdJihat which is abiding.
So sometimes comes to soul and sense The feeling which is evidence That very near about us lies The realm of spiritual mysteries. The sphere of the supernal powers Impinges on this world of ours. The low and dark horizon lifts, To light the scenic terror shifts; The breath of a diviner air Blows down the answer of a prayer: — That all our sorrow, pain, and doubt A great compassion clasps about, And law and goodness, love and force, Are wedded fast beyond divorce. Then duty leaves to love its task, The beggar Self forgets to ask; With smile of trust and folded hands, The passive soul in waiting stands To feel, as flowers the sun and dew, The One true Life its own renew.^
» J. G. Whittier, T?u Muling, GKN.-NUM. — 15
226 JACOB'S VISION
2. A Church witnesses also to the reality of man^s intercouru^ t<;i<^^od— It. ia*JiJ?e. Jacob's Beth-el, " tlie-gate of heaven." And so from very early times the words " Behold a ladder set up on earth, and the top of it reached to heaven " were recited at the consecration of Churches, and the first recorded promise of the Lord gives a permanent force to the vision of the patriarch when He said to the disciples, amazed that He had read the secret thoughts of Nathanael : " Verily, verily, I say unto you, ye shall see the heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man." A Church, in other words, answers to the title which was given to the first appointed House of God, " the Tent of Meeting." It is_the^ meetijig-place of God with man and of man with God. The thought is overwhelming. We are tempted to cry out with Jacob, when we realize what it means, " How dreadful is this place." We recall the words spoken to Moses, " No man shall sea my„lace iind Uve," or the confession of Isaiah, "Woe is me, for I antomdone ... for mine eyes have seen the King ia.his l^eemty." But the incarnation has changed our relation to God. In the Son of Man the glory of God is tempered to our vision. It is true that no man hath seen God at any time: that He dwelleth in light unapproachable, "Whom no man hath seen nor can see," yet we have also for our assurance the Lord's own words : " Ha., that hath seen me hath jseen the Father," not indeed seen God as God in His most awful majesty^ but God revealed through the love of His Son, — /-
^ Reviews of Miss Yonge's Ufe, and even of Mr. Keble's, spoke as though their country lives must have been quiet to dullness, or at least that they produced no incidents useful for biographical purposes. To those who at that time were their nearest neigh- bours, their lives were wonderful examples of the self -controlled vivacity of high spiritual existence. The eyes of our elders were fixed on the holiest realities of Spirit, and in the services of the English Church they found the atmosphere in which they breathed most freely. Theology was to them a thrilling interest, and they moved and spoke and thought with unseen presences round them, not psychical or fancy-spiritual, but as reaUzing the angels round about the Throne and the solemn awe of the Throne.^