The Pulpit Commentary — Matthew — Volume 1 — Section 212

nating of th11 world. Our Lord kindled the few men who accepted him as the Light of the world, and they in turn kindled others. He has trusted himself with his followers. He has left it to us to maint.ain the knowledge of him on the earth, and to hand on the light which all men need. Christians were not to retire and hide themselves, satisfied if they could keep their own souls alive. 'l'hey were to enter into all the innocent relationships and engagements of life, and so use them as to show their light. All our connections with the world are candlesticks, from which the light may advantageously shinP. Persecution itself is one. "Truth, like a torch, the more it's shook it shines." The parental relation is another candlestick. Natural talent may set a man on such an eminence that his light is shed over the land ; bnt all men have some stand from which they can shine, if it is in them to shine. Not the candlestick makes so much difference as the light you put in it. Docs any say, "How can I shine-a dull, torpid mass?" Yet not so torpid probably as never to try to influence your fellows in some way. And tbe dullest body may be a good reflector of light shed on it. The Christian's is not a self-kindled light, 2, The lesson more directly taugM is, that whatever illuminates must itself be visible. If your conduct is to teach a better way to men, your conduct must be seen. 'l'herefore are works here emphasized. Men cannot see your fine ideas, your noble purposes, your holy aspirations. Your thoughts about Christ, your faith in him, your tenderness of heart towards him, are as the oil in the lighthouse lamp. If no light is shown, shipwrecks will not be prevented, So it will not avail to prevent moral wrecks that you have felt anxious, devised ways of aiding, if you have done nothing. The man who is content to save his own soul, and is afraid to interfere with the wickedness around him, is not even saving his own soul. To the light hid under a bushel, or under a bed, one of two things will happen- it will either go out altogether, choked for want of air, or it will burn through its covering and find surprising expression for itself. For : 3. It is of the eesence of Christian character to shine, to become visible. There is a kind of Christianity which burns high or low according to the company it is in. But the fact that it can be thus artificially manipulated, like a gas-jet, sbows it is an artificial, and not a genuine, Christianity. If yon a.re a Christian you have a law which covers your whole life, and a new spirit within you. Can a man have new fresh blood in bis veins and that not show itself? Jnst as little can a man have the joy of Christ's love and the reviving energy of his Spirit in his heart,and these not be seen in his de~eanour. This witness- ing for Christ is not an optional matter. "The good tree will show the good fruit. It cannot go on bearing the old bad fruit out of modesty or a pretended shrinking from ostentation; it must reveal the righteousness of God within by the righteousness of God without, else it is a mockery." The practical object our Lord has in view is declared in the words, "Let your light thus shine before ;men, thnt they may see yolll' good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." How does this agree with the injunction to hide your good works-not to let your right hand know what your left hand does? In this way. We are to avoid the two extremes of ostentation and timorous shrinking in our conduct; to abandon all affectation, all false delicacy, all pretended modesty and real fear, and live out with simplicity and fearl~ssness the Chrilltian principle we know and accept. Observe that when our Lord specifies" good works" he does not exclude good wo~ds. Often it is a good work to speak the word wanted. And though it is often one of the most difficult of duties, it ie certain that we are guilty if we neglect this mode of confessing Christ before men. To be back- ward in this is a sign that our own light is burning low.-D. Vere.17-48.-Sermon on the mount: 3. Exceeding righteo'l/,Sness. A teacher who compels the public to look at an unfamiliar truth, the reformer who introduces a new style of goodness, will be misinterpreted just in proportion to the advance he makes upon former ideas. Our Lord renounced explicitly, and with warmth, the goodnes11 of the Pharisees, anJ the cry was at once raised against him as a destroyer of the Law, • libertine, a companion of loose people. He thus found himself called on publicly to repudiate the attitnde towards the Law ascribed to him, and to explain with fulnees, once for all, at the outset of hie ministry, the righteousness he required and exhibited. "I am not come to destroy the Law and the prophets, but to fulfil,n So fo.r as regards his own character this explanation has long since become superfluous, but there la m:. v. l-48.] TllE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MA.TTHEW. 205