214 THE USE OF SCRIPTURE
wars, by the restlessness and anxiety of nations and classes ; we ask impatiently if this wild confusion is the adequate result of eighteen centuries of the Gospel of Peace ? We ask impatiently, and the Bible offers us an interpretation of a history and life not unlike our own, and helps us to see how the counsel of God goes forward through all the vicissitudes of human fortunes and human wilfulness. Our hearts again constantly fail us for fear of the things which are coming on the world. The Bible inspires us with an unfailing hope. We are yet further perplexed by con- flicts of reasoning, by novelties of doctrines, by strange conclu- sions of bold controversialists. The Bible provides us with a sure touchstone of truth, while
The intellectual power, through words and things, Goes sounding on, a dim and perilous way,
and brings us back to a living fellowship with Him who is the Truth." 1
Gallery of sacred pictures manifold,
A minster rich in holy effigies,
And bearing on entablature and frieze
The hieroglyphic oracles of old.
Along its transept aureoled martyrs sit;
And the low chancel side-lights half acquaint
The eye with shrines of prophet, bard, and saint,
Their golden tablets traced in Holy Writ !
But only when on form and word obscure
Falls from above the white supernal light.
We read the mystic characters aright.
And light informs the silent portraiture,
Until we pause at last awe-held before
The One ineffable Face, love, wonder, and adore.*
II.
Eedemption.
" The sacred writings which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus : that the man of God may be complete."
The whole meaning of the Old Testament may be summed up in two words — redemption and sanctification. On the one hand, it is one vast prophetic testimony to Christ, to His person, to His
1 Life and Letters of Brooke Foss Westcott, ii. 267. * J. G. Whittier.
2 TIMOTHY III. 14-17 215
work, to His kingdom ; on the other hand, it is the Divine method of teaching man through the facts of history and the various circumstances of life how to subdue the evil within him, and to become conformed in very truth to that image of God in which he was originally created. Whereas we are sometimes told that to insist upon any correspondence between prediction and fulfil- ment in the Old Testament is to degrade the ancient prophets to the level of the soothsayer or the gipsy fortune-teller, it would be much truer to say that the whole Old Testament is one vast pre- diction from its first page to its last. It is occupied with one glorious hope. This is its mark and peculiar characteristic. No Jewish legislator, prophet, or singer ever looks back to the past with fond regret. Each looks forward with ardent longing for the advent of the coming Deliverer. This is the golden thread which runs through that marvellous, diversified web of law and history, of song and fable, of proverb and allegory by which the Old Testament is marked. Christ is the sum and substance of all its law, its poetry, its ritual, its prophecies. The lives and devout aspirations of all holy men of old point to Him. Without Him these ancient writings, as St. Augustine says, have no point or meaning, but are flat, stale, and unprofitable. Behold Him in them all, and they become at once instinct with life and beauty ; or, as the same Father profoundly says, the New Testament is latent in the Old, the Old patent in the New.
1. The first of the characters ascribed to the sacred writings is that they are the appointed means of grace. God Himself is the only Saviour : no power but His own is able to do this work. He might, if He had so pleased, have accomplished it simply by the direct and inclusive exertion of His own will and power, without requiring the concurrent action of any other being, or the employment of any concurrent instriiniental means. If He chooses to adopt the latter scheme. He has the right to pre- scribe the means or instruments to be used, and to assign wliat- ever function or effect PTe may see fit to each appoinled oidi nance. He may so cundiiion the exercise of His own and only ethcacious power on the insLrumonlal means tliat the use of the insiin- ment will infallibly carry the em])l()yuient of the power Oi H. may appoint the use of the instrument to be simply cniicuricni
2i6 THE USE OF SCRIPTURE
with the use of His own power, but as in no way so conditioning His power as to subject it to the will of the human user of the means and remove it from His own absolute control. But what- ever function may be assigned to the appointed ordinance, the appointment of such ordinance and the positive requirement of its use for ever settles both the question in regard to the ordinance itself and the question as to who is to use it. Any interference on the part of any one, either to change an ordinance or to qualify the persons who are entitled to employ it, is the presumption and the inconceivable guilt of interfering with the legislative authority of the Almighty God Himself. Now the Scriptures say of them- selves that " these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God ; and that believing ye might have life through his name." They say that "whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope." " Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way ? By taking heed thereto according to thy word." "Sanctify them through thy truth ; thy word is truth." " Born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever." " The law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ." Believers are exhorted to " take the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God." These testimonials are clear, positive, and peremptory. Their meaning is so plain that it cannot be made plainer. They teach that inasmuch as salvation is by faith, and faith must be based upon truth, the Word of God, which contains all His testimony, is one of the chiefest of the means of grace. They teach that as faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God, it is at the peril of faith, and consequently at the peril of salvation, that we refuse the use of the Scriptures. To neglect them is to assume the responsibility of neglecting a necessary means of life.