historv of the Church I What a checkered and often tumultuous and much-tried career was allotted to her I All these illustrations from God's Word, showing the determination of God that his people should not suffer the peril of overmuch ease and become as Mnab, and as they who because they have no changes, therefore, etc. 2. 2. By analogy. God suffers nothing to be without change. Even the rocks and hills, the solid globe, all have experienced, and do and will experience, change. The seasons alternate in their orderly cliange. Storm and tempest cleanse the air which, as in the Swiss valleys, would otherwise become stagnant. The great sea one prophet describes aa " the troubled sea," because it can never be quiet. And yet more is this refusal of ease and quiet, this law of change, seen in all forms of life. (1) In vegetable life. " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die," etc. And it springs up, " First the blade, then the ear, then," etc. All the varied and ever- acting processes of change in the whole plant-world are in proof. (2) In animal life. Change is ever procei ding there. Even when we are asleep the work still goes on. For it to be otherwise is dissolution and death. (3) In menkd life. Not to have that aroused, stirred by the study of fresh truth and the readjustment of old, would be to condemn to feebleness and semi-idiocy. (4) In social life.
" The old crder changetb, giving place to new. , . . Lest one good custom should corrupt the world."
(5) In ecdesiastical life. What was the Eeformation but the tempest-storm that mshed through the valleys of the Church life of that day, where the air had become stagnant and so corrupt and poisonous that men could not breathe it and live? But the wild storm came and the air was made pure, not in the reformed lands alone, though there chiefly, but in those also that cling to the old faith. Such corruption and abomioableness as characterized the ante- Reformation Church were not again possible. (6) In political life. Where that is healthy, overmuch ease is not possible. It has not been so with us. It has in the empires of the East, China, etc., and see the result. (7) In moral life. Virtue must be tried, there must be conflict and struggle if it is to continue and grow more truly itself. Hence, as in all other forms of life, we should conclude that the moral law would hold good in the spiritual life. And that this is so we learn also : 3. By experietice. We do not glide into heaven. We are not translated, whilst in a trance, out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God. But the often severe spiritual conflicts of repentance and confession and striving against sin. " Yea, we must fight if we would win." And God's providence without us as well as his Spirit within is ever forbidding our being at ease continually. Sorrows and losses, temptations and trials, changes and adversities, — they are ever " moving us from vessel to vessel." God forces on us " changes," lest we fear not his Name.
II. Bdt why is all this ? Because in our nature there are rooted evils which can only be got rid of by the action of this law of change. Such evils are : 1. Self-urill. You have seen a mountain stream come brawling along over its stony bed. But on it goes, heeding not until, right in mid-stream, there is a huge rook. Down comes the stream full tilt against it, as if it were saying, " Just you get out of my way." But that is precisely the thing the rock does not do, and so the stream comes right against it. And then what a fuss, and a froth, and a foam there arises ! but the rock does not move, and after a moment you will see the stream gliding softly, smoothly, quietly round the rock, and going more gently on its way. That is one of the ten thousand natural parables with which the world is full. That stream of our self-will, determined to go its own way, rushes on its course. The rock of God's law of change and adversity ijA trial stands in its way and will not move, and the stream of self-will is broken against it, as God intended it should be. Only by this law can this evil be cured. 2. Pride. Trial forces men to call on God. 3. Unbelief. This law of trouble and change shatters the materialism and atheism of the present day. They break down, and the soul in the day of its trouble calls upon God. 4. Sdfishness. Ease fosters this, as it fosters all those other evils named. But trial, adversity, teach men to be " touched with the feeling " of their brethren's infirmities. 5. Love of the world j and 6. Indolence. These which ease fosters, God's law of change does much to cure.
in. How, THEN, BHOtTLD WE BBAB OUBSELVES TOWARDS THIS LAW OF OHABTEmNO
OHAXai? Ct Heb. xli., which teaches: I. That wt do not despise it. By denying it, m
«■. XLTm. 1-47.] THE BOOK OP THE PEOPHET JEEEMIAH, 241
hj defying it. Some do this and persevere in the sins which it was designed to amend. 2. That we do not "faint " under it. We are not to give up in despair, letting the hands hang down and the knees totler and become feeble. But we are to take this law as a spur and lash and ask, " Wherefore dost thou contend with me?" and see to it that we amend. But : 3. Svbmit ourselves unto Ood. " Sljall we not much ratlier be in subjection unto the Father," etc.? Let his will ba ours; let his way oui wajr.
*He always wins who sides with thM| No chance by him is lost ; Tby will is sweetest to blm whea It triumphs at his cost"
(Faber.)
Then let ns welcome whatever God sends, trying though it be, remembering tie peril of ease and the sure profit of trial. — 0.