126 ALWAYS AT HOME
is God's house a place of reverence, it is also a place of joy and gladness and shouting.
^ There is a power in public worship, in the utterance of common sorrows, needs, and hopes, in the prayer that is breathed and the praise that is sung in concert, not with the crowd that fills the sanctuary, but with the innumerable company of all lands and ages who have drunk of the same spring and gone strengthened on their way, which they strangely miss who teach that worship is a worn-out superstition, and that only in the clear light of law can men walk and be blest. While man sins and suffers, while there is blood-tinged sweat upon his brow, while there is weeping in his home and anguish in his heart, that voice can never lose its music which brings forth the comfort and inspiration of the gospel, which tells the sin-tormented spirit the tale of the infinite pity, and bids it lay its sobbing wretchedness to rest on the bosom of infinite love.^
2. But the Temple was not His only place of learning, of teaching, or of prayer. He learned the Scriptures in Nazareth ; He taught by the shore of the lake ; He prayed on the mountain- top. Where does He find symbols whereby to speak of what goes on in the mind and before the face of His Father in heaven ? Not in the Temple ; not in its rites ; not on its altars ; not in its holy of holies ; He finds them in the world and its lovely-lowly facts; on the roadside, in the field, in the vineyard, in the garden, in the house ; in the family, and the commonest of its affairs — the lighting of the lamp, the leavening of the meal, the neighbour's borrowing, the losing of the coin, the straying of the sheep. Even in the unlovely facts also of the world which He turns to holy use, such as the unjust judge, the false steward, the faithless labourers, He ignores the Temple. See how He drives the devils from the souls and bodies of men, as we the wolves from our sheepfolds ! how before Him the diseases, scaly and spotted, hurry and flee ! The world has for Him no chamber of terror. He walks to the door of the sepulchre, the sealed cellar of His Father's house, and calls forth its four days' dead. He rebukes the mourners. He stays the funeral, and gives back the departed children to their parents' arms. The roughest of its servants do not make Him wince ; none of them are so arrogant as to disobey His word ; He falls asleep in the midst of the storm that threatens
* J. Gregory, Phillips Brooks, 18.
ST. LUKE II. 49 121
to swallow His boat. All His life He was among His Father's things, either in heaven or in the world — not only then when they found Him in the Temple at Jerusalem. He is still among His Father's things, everywhere about in the world, everywhere throughout the wide universe.
Among my kinsfolk and my friends
I sought for Christ, but found Him not;
The joy of earth in sadness ends, The love of hearts is oft forgot.
Each hath his own familiar cares,
And others' burdens lightly bears !
I sought for Christ, but found Him not: Sorrowing, 0, whither shall I turn ?
Lo ! Zion's gates, yon hallowed spot,
Where praise and prayer like incense burn.
Back to Thy temple I'll repair,
Secure, with joy, to find Thee there.
I seek for Christ, but find Him not
Even there, as yet I hope to find; This long day's march, life's pilgrim lot,
Eolls on, and He seems oft behind. But I shall find whom here I love In God's Jerusalem above.^
1 C. L. Ford.
Always at Work.
»as
Literature.
Biggs (C. E. D.), The Diaconate of Jesus, 19. Burrell, (D. J.), The Church in the Fort, 63. Calthrop (G.), The Lost Sheep Found, 89. Campbell (J. M.), Bible Questions, 184,
„ (R. J.), The Song of Ages, 221. Capen (E. H.), The College and the Higher Life, 109. Cox (S.), The Bird's Nest, 16. Edwards (H.), The Spiritual Observatory, 97. Goodman (J. H.), The Lordship of Christ, 143. Gregory (S.), Among tJie Roses, 191. Houghton (W.), The Secret of Power, 65. Howatt (J. R.), The Children's Pew, 177.
„ „ Jesus the Poet, 213.
Jefferson (C. E.), My Father's Business, 101. King (E.), TJie Love and Wisdom of God, 266. Pentecost (G.), Alarylebone Presbyterian Church Pulpit, i. No. 29. Percival (J.), Some Helps for School Life, 101. Pope (W. B.), Discourses, 107. Ridge way (C. J.), The King and His Kingdom, 60. Roberts (R.), My Jewels, 12a Salmon (G.), Sermons, 33. Smellie (A.), In the Hour of Silence, 307. Spurgeon (C. H.), New Park Street Pulpit, iii. (1857), No. 122. Vaughan (C. J.), Doncaster Sermons, 375.
„ (J.), Sermons to Cliildren, v. 147. Wace (H.), Some Central Points of our Lord!s Ministry, 21. West (R. A.), The Greatest Things in the World, 63. Wbyte (A.), The Walk, Conversation, and Character of Jesus Christ our
Lord, 59. Wilkinson (J. B.), Mission Sermons, ii. 90. Children's Pulpit : First Sunday after the Epiphany, ii. 345. Christian World Pulpit, x. 126 (B. S. Bird) ; xlv. 147 (J. A. Beet) ; IxviL