3. And it is, further, a picture of the timid, unsatisfactory Christian — unsatisfactory to God, unsatisfactory to man. What is the use of a lamp that does not give light, a knife that will not cut, a pen that splutters when you attempt to write with it ? How many professing Christians there are who are not burning and shining lights, but smoking lamps ! and what a trouble they are both in the Church and out of it ! In a village church lighted with lamps, if one among them smokes, it attracts a great deal of attention and criticism ; the others are scarcely noticed. Just so is it with Christians who are symbolised by a smoking lamp. Everybody observes them, and everybody criticises them. They bring dishonour upon themselves and upon their Church.
But though the lamp be a smoking one, He will not quench it. How patient is the Saviour in His dealings with men !
ISAIAH
He'll never quench the smoking flax, But raise it to a flame.
271
The harsh, pharisaical spirit says of the unsatisfactory tree, " Cut it down ; why cumbereth it the ground ? " But Jesus says, " Let it stand this year also." Here is guidance for the Church. What Christ would not do, the Church must not do. " If a man be overtaken in a fault," what is to be done with him ? Is he to be at once excommunicated ? " Not so," says the apostle. " Ye which are spiritual restore such an one." We must not quench the smoking lamp. " Comfort the feeble- minded," cries Paul in another place : stretch out a helping hand to him ; speak a word of encouragement. Forgive such an one even unto seventy times seven. As long as the ship floats, it must never be abandoned ; as long as there is a vestige of life in the plant, it must not be uprooted. We dare not extinguish the smoking lamp.
In Christ there was no scorn, no contempt, no insolence, no taunting. One poet speaks of —
Those eyes. Which, though they turn away sometimes, They never can despise.
And another has written —
For He's not a man that He should judge by the
seeing of His eyes. He's not the son of man that He should anyone
despise ; He's God Himself, and far too kind for that, and far
too wise.
He did not despise our world. This earth of ours is the Valley of the Humiliation of the Son of God. He did not despise our nature, for He took it on Himself, and has carried it to the Eternal Throne. He did not despise the meanest of His creatures. Aristotle's " magnanimous man " used irony with the common herd. Christ cared for the individual. He never saw men as in a herd. In His days at Nazareth He bathed in the fountain of youth, and was wise in the lore hid from a world grown old. Did a golden dawn entrance sea and shore for Him
272 THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE
in that small and homely world — a world of few ideas and little knowledge ? Doubtless he did not miss the morning glory. But he was never deceived, and in every step of His pilgrimage till He ascended the high and hard bed where His work was accomplished, He was still the same, full of grace and truth. To Him the single life was of infinite pathos and importance. The mystery and immensity of the universe did not perplex Him. He had come from Sion. Nor did He despair of any human soul. To despair of a soul, however sunken, is to scorn that soul, but the seat of the scorner was not for Him, He drew near to the fallen, made Himself familiar with their misery, understood all their wild, weary wish for the mercy of the grave, saw how they were ground down without help or horizon, and declared to them a gospel of boundless hope. He suffered them to lay their abased heads at His feet that He might lift them up for ever. This was more than justice. True, He was dyed to the depths in justice, but He was full of pity, full of reverence, full of love. This was the attitude of the Redeemer towards our lost humanity, and this was the attitude which befitted the world's " Expectancy and Rose." He came that the lost and erring might return and know the great warmth of the Divine welcome.^
H Christ loves and employs and fans into bright and glowing flame dimly burning wicks. They are changed into lamps that shine for the guidance of wandering feet, into beacon fires that warn the voyagers from sandbank and iron coast, into torches which hand on His message to the generation following, into lighthouse rays and beams which conduct storm-tossed sailors to their desired haven.^
I know not what the future hath
Of marvel or surprise, Assured alone that life and death
His mercy underlies.
And if my heart and flesh are weak
To bear an untried pain, The bruised reed He will not break,
But strengthen and sustain.
1 W. Robertson Nicoll, The Garden of Nuts, p. 112. ' A. Smellie, In the Hour of SiUnce, p. 92.