4H SELF-KEEPING
that the indwelling Jesus always maintains the fulness of the Spirit.
^ Some maimed bird from the woods is brought into the house and the children want to tend it with all the gentleness of hospital nurses. They stretch out entreating hands and make pretty speeches, spread for it royal banquets, offer it a generous partner- ship in the use of their toys. But there is no common ground- work of ideas between them. It cannot read these signs of friendship, and the poor thing is as unhappy as though hawks were hovering in the clouds. If it has not already died of fright, the first time the window sash is open it flies away to the woods. It cannot appreciate or interpret the love which would fain woo its friendship in a strange world. It lacks power to perceive. But God's love is conscious of all other loves, and has the power, moreover, of interpreting itself to willing and lowly hearts. It knows where to find the first sign of this ethereal affection, and how to enter into fellowship with it.i
^ The love of God in our hearts is a gift from the Lord ; it is a fire which lights up all things arid, and whoever is so disposed can instantly feel it warm and inflame his heart.^
Lord, a happy child of Thine, Patient through the love of Thee,
In the light, the life divine, Lives and walks at liberty.
Leaning on Thy tender care.
Thou hast led my soul aright; Fervent was my morning prayer,
Joyful is my song to-night.
0 my Saviour, Guardian true,
All my life is Thine to keep; At Thy feet my work I do,
In Thy arms I fall asleep.*
(2) We must keep ourselves. — This can only mean that we ought to love the Lord our God with the full force of decision and purpose. In the sovereign faculty of will metaphysicians find the centre and strength of personality. Our love to God must not be vague sentiment tincturing our talk with a pale poetry, but the settled purpose and determination of the soul commanding, com-
1 T. G. Selby, The Alienated Croiim, 363.
2 Savonarola. ' A. L, Waring.
JUDE 20, 21 425
pelling, triumphing in all the crises of life. Love without will is the merest froth ; but springing from the depths of the soul, expressing a firm and hearty conviction and resolution, it passes into the master-passion of life. Let it, then, be our settled purpose to keep a warm heart. " I will love thee, 0 Lord, my strength." I will not permit abounding iniquity to chill my heart, or abounding prosperity to steel it. I will not allow Nature, humanity, self, or any idols of the world, to have dominion over me, but I will love Thee ; I will watch, and, lest time and cir- cumstance should spoil the fervour and freshness of the heart, I will ever welcome new awakenings and inspirations.
^ It is not a command to love Him, but to keep yourselves in His love, objects of His loving. Do you know how to do it ? If a mother should write to her boy and at the close of the letter should say, " You have a good teacher, keep yourself in his love," he would know what to do. He would be careful not to disobey, thoughtful not to displease, watchful to render any service in his power. If there were some sickly boy, and we should tell him he was to be excused from school for a few weeks, and should say to him, " Keep yourself in the sunshine," would he know what to do ? He would keep out of the shadows, and that is easily done. If this building were casting a shadow, he would keep on the sunny side. If yonder tree were casting a shadow, he would keep away from it. He would remember the injunction, " Keep your- self in the sunshine — out of the shadow." There is a place where the unmanly and the impure congregate. The influence of the place is baleful — a dark, damp shadow. Keep out of it ; and keep in the love of God.^
3. The best way to keep ourselves in the love of God is to be always in the fulness of the Spirit. — There is a touchstone about the Holy Ghost that discovers evil, and evil cannot live before Him. This is a highly organized age. We are all living in the midst of environments of many kinds. There are streams of influences that bear in upon us from without, and there is a peculiar joyousness about the consecrated life, — a spiritual exhilaration — and with that exhilaration there is an accessibility to human sympathy and influence, and in all these there are perpetual dangers which we must be on our guard against so that we may not be drawn away from the love of Jesus Christ.
» G. W. Hinckley.
426 SELF-KEEPING
T^ Love is not to be a rare mood of the soul, but its sublime habit. Travellers in the East tell of the striking difference in the appearance of the same tract of country at different seasons of the year. What at one time is a garden, glowing with brilliant hues, and rich with pasture, at another is an absolute waste, frightful and oppressive from its sterility. So is it too commonly with the soul, which at one time is like a watered garden glowing in the heavenly sunshine and then directly cold and desolate. It ought not so to be. God's love to us is ever glowing, revealing itself in new and richer tokens, and our love to Him should reflect the same constancy.^