^ The only way for us to be delivered from the dominion of our unconscious faults is to increase the depth and closeness and constancy of our communion with Jesus Christ ; and then they will drop away from us. Mosquitoes and malaria, the one unseen in their minuteness, and the other, " the pestilence that walketh in darkness," haunt the swamps. Go up on the hill-top, and neither of them is found. So if we live more and more on the high levels, in communion with our Master, there will be fewer and fewer of these unconscious sins buzzing and stinging and poisoning our lives, and more and more will His grace conquer and cleanse.^
^ The consummate ability of Stas, the Belgian chemist, is celebrated because he " eliminated from his chemicals every trace of that pervasive element, sodium, so thoroughly that even its spectroscopic detection was impossible." But such is the efficacy of Divine grace that it can eliminate so thoroughly every trace of that pervasive and persistent element known as sin that we may be presented before the throne holy and unreprovable and without blemish. That the sincere may attain this purification, they are prepared to pass through the hot fires of bitter and manifold discipline.^
^ A. Maclaren, The God of the Amen, 84. 2 W. L. Watkiuson, The Fatal Barter, 105.
The jMinistry of Surprise.
361
Literature.
Black (H.), Christ's Service of Love, 209. Martin (A.), Winning the Soul, 199. Morrison (G. H.), Flood-Tide, 252.
„ „ The Return of the Angels, 143.
Philip (A.), TJie Father's Hand, 157.
The Ministry of Surprise.
Thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness. — Ps. xxi. 3.
1. This is a companion Psalm to the one that goes before it. They both deal with the same general situation, the outbreak of national war, but differ in this respect, that while the first is a Psalm of prayer before the people go forth to the battle, the second is a Psalm of thanksgiving after they have returned victorious. In the former we are to conceive them gathered in the Temple, the king at their head, to entreat the aid of their fathers' God, that in the hour of danger He may send them help out of the sanctuary and strength from His holy hill. But in the latter the danger is past. The king's arms have been successful. His enemies have been scattered. He has re-entered the city gates with his exultant army, and made his triumphal way through the streets, and now once more, as is most meet, stands before the Lord, who has given him the victory, while priests and people make the sacred courts ring again with their shouts of thanks- giving and joy. " The king shall joy in thy strength, 0 Lord ; and in thy salvation how greatly shall he rejoice ! Thou hast given him his heart's desire, and hast not withholden the request of his lips. . . . For the king trusteth in the Lord, and through the mercy of the most High he shall not be moved. Be thou exalted, Lord, in thine own strength : so will we sing and praise thy power." x^-'H
2. The gist of the text is that God's wise grace can outstrip
the present stage of our experience, can pass on into the future, "^'
and be busy on our behalf before we arrive there. He not only
attends us with the blessings of His goodness, He " prevents " us
with them as well — goes on before and sows the days to come
with mercy, so that we find it waiting us when we arrive, and
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364 THE MINISTRY OF SURPRISE
reap — or may reap — nothing but goodness as we go. It is a pro- found, most comfortable truth for us to rest our minds on,
*[j There is in theology a term, still used, " prevenient grace," meaning the grace which acts on a sinner hefore repentance in- ducing him to repent, the grace by which he attains faith and receives power to will the good. Milton, when describing the repentance of Adam and Eve in Paradise Lost, when they con- fessed their sin and prayed for forgiveness, puts it :
Thus they in lowliest plight repentant stood Praying, for from the Mercy-seat above Prevenient Grace descending had remov'd The stony from their hearts, and made new flesh Eegenerate grow instead.
But we must not limit God's prevenient grace to the act of repentance, to the steps which lead up to the consciousness of sonship with God.^
I.
A Prepared World.
1. When we come upon the stage of existence we find that the world has been prepared for us. " Thou hast formed the world to be inhabited " is one of the deep sayings of the prophets, For whatever ends the world has been created, it has been fashioned upon the lines of man. It has been decked in beauty for the human eye ; covered with sustenance for the human frame; stored with energies that would have slept unused but for the large intelligence of man. Does the newborn child need to be clothed ? Sheep have been pasturing upon the hills. Does the newborn child need to be fed ? Mysterious changes have been preparing food. And does the newborn child need to be warmed ? Why then, unnumbered centuries ago, the leaves were falling with the sunshine in them, that to-day we might have summer on the hearth. Not into an unprepared world is the little infant flung. Nature never calls, " I am not ready, nor can I support this gift of a new life." Nature has been getting ready for millenniums, since she awoke from the primeval chaos ; and in her depths, and on her hills of pasturage, has been preparing for this very hour.