Voysey (C), Sermons (1876), No. 36 ; (1884) No. 34 ; (1907) No. 10. Walpole (G. H. S.), Life's Chance, 81. Christian World Pulpit, liv. 168 (Scott Holland). Churchman's Pulpit : lat Sunday after Trinity : xxi. 481 (Qrimley), 483
Moore ; 18th Sunday after Trinity, xxxviii, 402 (Melvill). Church of England Magazine, li. 80 (Burland). Contemporary Pulpit, 2nd Ser., ii. 294 (Watson).
368
The Ray and the Reflection.
Wf love, because he first loved us.— i John iv. 19.
Some truths, when we have learned them, are to us like precious jewels which we keep in caskets, hidden most of the time from sight, our gieat satisfaction regarding them being simply their possession, simply that they are ours. Other truths, when we have learnec them, are like new countries into which our lives have enterei, and in which they thenceforth constantly live. There is a n3W sky over our head and a new earth under our feet. They fold themselves about us and touch every thought and action. E/erything that we do or think or are is different because of them. Of this second sort is the truth of the priority of God's Icve.
^ I think I might say of this sentence what the poet says of prayer : it is " the simplest form of speech that infant lips can try," and yet it is one of the " sublimest strains that reach the majesty oq high." Take a little believing child and ask her why she loves the Saviour, and she will reply at once, " Because He loved nu and died for me": then ascend to heaven where the saints arj perfect in Christ Jesus and put the same question, and with united breath the whole choir of the redeemed will reply, " He hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood." When v/e begin to love Christ we love Him because He first loved us ; and when we grow in grace till we are capable of the very highest degree of spiritual understanding and affection, we still havei no better reason for loving Him than this, " Because he first lovem us." ^
i(
hum
God's Love to us.
God is first. — Unless God had been first, we — our whole an race in general and each of us in particular — never would
^ C. H. Spurgeon. AS.-JUDE — 24
370 THE RAY AND THE REFLECTION
have been at all. We are what we are because He is what He is. Everything that we do God has first made it possible for us to do. Every act of ours, as soon as it is done, is grasped into a great world of activity which comes from Him ; and thert) the influence and effect of our action is determined. Everything that we know is true already before our knowledge of it. Our knowing it is only the opening of our intelligence to receive what is and always has been a part of His being who is the universal truth. Every deed or temper or life is good or bad as it is in harmony or out of harmony with Him. Everywhere God is first ; and mau, coming afterward, enters into Him and finds in God the setting and the background of his life. If we love, He loved first.
% It is as when up the morning sky, all coldly beautiful with ordered ranks of cloud on cloud, is poured the glow of sunrise, and every least cloud, still the same in place and shape, burns with the transfiguring splendour of the sun. So is it when the priority of existence is seen to rest in a Person, and the back- ground of life is God. Then every new arrival instantly reports itself to Him, and is described in terms of its relationsh ip to Him. Every activity of ours answers to some previous activity of His. Do we hope ? It is because we have caught the soun d of some promise of His. Do we fear ? It is because we have had some glimpse of the dreadfulness of getting out of harmony with Him. Are we curious and inquiring ? It is that we may leariU some of His truth. Do we resist evil ? We are fighting His enemies. Do we help need ? We are relieving His children. Do we love Him ? It is an answer of gratitude for His love to us. Do we live ? It is a projection and extension of His being. Do we die ? It is the going home of our immortal souls to Him.^
3- The love of God to us precedes our love to God. — From all eternity the Lord looked upon His people with an eye of L'^ve, and as nothing can be before eternity. His love was first. He loved us before we had any being, before we had any desire to be lo ved, before any repentance on our part was possible. Divine lov "^ is its own cause, and does not derive its streams from anythin In us whatsoever. It flows spontaneously from the heart of ( 1, finding its deep wellsprings within His own bosom. This a great comfort to us, because, being uncreated, it is unchangee ». ?. If it had been set upon us because of some goodness in us, t hen