^ If you put this Book into the hands of your children directly they have left the cradle and are learning to read ; and if you give them a sufficiently good education to enable them to read the Book and to understand it as they understand other books ; and if you should tell them that they should try to use this Book very much as a soldier uses his book of regulations, to learn how to behave himself in the army, in the battle, in the face of the foe ; if you teach your children that this is the purpose of the Bible, for instruction or education in righteousness, your children will find
^ Griffith John : The Story of Fifty Years in China, 4, 2 D. M. Ross. I THESS.-HEB. — 1 5
226 THE USE OF SCRIPTURE
their way to Jesus Christ, they will find salvation, the righteous- ness that is in Him. And not only will they find Jesus Christ, but in the process of finding Him they will have become men and women, and not mere babes under tuition. You will find that there has been produced in them a strength of mind and of conscience which will make them different from other people who have been taught in easier but less effectual ways.^
^ E. F. Horton, England's Danger, 106.
The Crown of Righteousness.
Literature.
Aitchison (J.), A Bag with Holes, 177. Banks (L. A.), Paul and His Friends, 338.
„ „ Hidden Wells of Comfort, 101.
Boyd (A. K. H.), The Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson, ii. 311. Brooks (P.), The Spiritual Man, 258. Brown (C), in Gh'eat Texts of the New Testament, 13. Chad wick (G. A.), Pilate's Gift, 264. Christlieb (T.), Memoir and Sermons, 439. ClifFord (J.), Typical Christian Leaders, 85. Cross (J.), Old Wine and New, 139. Dowen (Z. T.), Christus Consolator, 38. Drury (T. W.), The Prison-Ministry of St. Paul, 69, 211. Fairbairn (A. M.), Christ in the Centuries, 107. Granger (W.), The Average Man, 169. Greenhough (J. G.), The Cross in Modern Life, 219. Jackson (G.), Tlie Table-Talk of Jesus, 237. Jenkins (E. E.), Life and Christ, 223. Liddon (H. P.), Advent in St. Paul's, 378. Maclaren (A.), Expositions : 2 Timothy, etc., 100.
„ „ Leaves from the Tree of Life, 246.
Manning (H. E.), The Rule of Faith, 347. Matheson (G.), Messages of Hope, 1 89.
Neale (J. M.), Sermons Preached in Sackville College Chapel, iii. 415. Price (A. C), Fifty Sermons, xi. 9. Eyle (J. C), Assurance, 7. Shelf ord (L. E.), By Way of Bememhrcmce, 55. Soyres (J. de), The Children of Wisdom, 141. Swanson (W. S.), Gethsemane, 182. Talmage (T. de W.), Sermons, vi. 397. Tyng (S. H.), The People's Pulpit, New Ser., i. 73. Virgin (S. H.), Spiritual Sanity, 110. Watkinson (W. L.), Themes for Hours of Meditation, 197. Christian Age, xlii. 53 (T. de W. Talmage). Christian World Pulpit, xlix. 202 (J. G. Greenhough); Ixii. 67 (R.
Thomas) ; Ixxxii. 394 (J. E. Wray). Churchman's Pulpit : Sermons to the Young, xvi. 591 (A. H. Ross). Clergyman's Magazine, 3rd Ser., iv. 329 (F. B. Proctor) ; 3rd Ser., xii. 357
(A. Irving). Contemporary Pulpit, 2nd Ser., ii. 239 (P. Brooks). Homiletic Review, xxi. 533 (A. C. Dixon).
The Crown of Righteousness.
For I am already being offered, and the time of my departure is come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith : henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give to me at that day : and not only to me, but also to all them that have loved his appearing. — 2 Tim. iv. 6-8.
These are among St. Paul's last words, and they are bathed in unutterable pathos. The old man, his hair whitened with age, his face furrowed with care, his body worn with disease and damaged by brutal persecution, is a captive in a miserable dungeon in Nero's Eome; and although his speech breathes the calm of heaven, yet the wretchedness of his imprisonment makes him regret that he left " a cloak at Troas " that would have warmed him in the winter's biting cold, or shielded him from the dungeon's perilous damp. Still more keenly does he regret that he has to face his loneliness without the tender solace of his son Timothy's presence, and the cheering companionship of his " books and papers." It is a hard lot for the aged Crusader ; but he is a hardy and chivalrous knight, who has braved a thousand perils in love for his Divine Leader, and therefore he is not cast down.
I.
St. Paul's Present State.
" I am already being offered, and the time of my departure is come."
1. Notice, first, the quiet courage which looks death full in the face without a tremor. The language implies that St. Paul knows his death hour is all but here. " I am already being offered " — the process is begun, his sufferings at the moment are, as it were, the initial steps of his sacrifice — " and the time of my departure is come." The tone in which he tells Timothy this is
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230 THE CROWN OF RIGHTEOUSNESS
very noticeable. There is no sign of excitement, no tremor of emotion, no affectation of Btoicism in the simple sentences. He is not playing up to a part or pretending to be anything which he is not. If ever language sounded perfectly simple and genuine, this does. With an unforced courage St. Paul fronts his fate and looks death in the eyes. The anticipation does not dull his interest in God's work in the world, as witness the warnings and exhortations of the context. It does not withdraw his sympathies from his companions. It does not hinder him from continuing his studies and pursuits, or from providing for small matters of daily convenience. If ever a man was free from any taint of fanaticism or morbid enthusiasm, it is this man waiting so calmly in his prison for his death.