Christian men ought so to live that it were idle to speak of a
comparison between them and the men of the world. It should not be a
comparison, but a contrast. No scale of degrees should be possible: the
believer should be a direct and manifest contradiction to the
unregenerate. The life of a saint should be altogether above and out of
the same list as the life of a sinner. We should compel our critics not
to confess that moralists are good, and Christians a little better; but
while the world is darkness, we should manifestly be light; and while
the world lieth in the Wicked One, we should most evidently be of God,
and overcome the temptations of that Wicked One. Wide as the poles
asunder, are life and death, light and darkness, purity and sin. There
should be as much difference between the worldling and the Christian, as
between hell and heaven, between destruction and eternal life. As we
hope at last that there shall be a great gulf separating us from the
doom of the impenitent, there should be here a deep and wide gulf
between us and the ungodly. The purity of our character should be such,
that men must take knowledge of us that we are of another and superior
race. If we were what we profess to be, there would be no difficulty in
detecting the Christian from the worldling. But, alas! the Church is so
much adulterated, that we have to abate our glorying, and cannot exalt
our character as we would. O, for the time when “our conversation shall
be in heaven,” and the ignoble life of the worldly man shall be rebuked
by our Christ-like character! God grant us more and more to be clearly a
chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people;
that we may show forth the praises of Him who has called us out of
darkness into his marvellous light.