The Worldiness of Nominal Chirsitan

THE WORLDLINESS OF NOMINAL CHRISTIANS.
BY REV. E. B. WEBB. D. D.
Published by Vote of the Congregational Council.
BOSTON: NICHOLS AND NOYES. 1866.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by NICHOLS AND NOYES, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. CAMBRIDGE: STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SONS.
JOHN, writing to fathers and young men, uses this language, terse and decisive: " Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world* If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him" Is there occasion for Christians now to take this stringent exhortation home to their own heart and life? and are we ready to apply a test so incisive and irresistible?
It seems to be taken for granted, that the members of our churches are worldly-minded. It is a root disease, blighting our strength, and repelling the Divine approaches. It is a guilty state, calling for self-scrutiny, immediate repentance, and practical reform. How many are willing to look into this matter, and determine what spirit they are of? Are you?
Let us see. Paul makes a clear, sharp distinction between the flesh and the Spirit: “To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace." And the test he puts in this way: “They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit." Now, we are not going into the street for evidence; nor into places of business, nor into places of pleasure, nor into circles of friendship, to note the conversation; nor into Christian homes, to learn, from the tastes and habits of the children, what is the dominant spirit of the parents. This might be very conclusive, and still very superficial. Let me put it and leave it to every one's own conscience: Say, brother, in the presence of God, and to Him who searches the heart, have you been spiritually minded or worldly-minded?
“No man can serve two masters." “Ye cannot serve God and mammon." Either the love of the world or the love of God must be uppermost. And, if a man love the world, “how dwelleth the love of God in him?”
Paul puts the test still further: “But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you." There is a difference between a dwelling and an inn. The one is a place for transient visitors; the other, a permanent abode, a home. Now, we have had a great many good thoughts during the last half-dozen years; but have our hearts been any thing more than an inn, into which they have entered and from which they have departed like transient visitors? Jesus was constrained to abide with the two disciples till they knew Him, and had a message for those at Jerusalem. Have you constrained Him to abide with you? Or is this all that you know, that He has occasionally passed by?
The Comforter was given expressly to " abide ': with you for ever. You know how He lifts the soul into sympathy with Jesus; how the world seems but vanity and ashes, and the kingdom of heaven real and precious, when He is present. Has your heart been a home for the Comforter? Blessed companionship! happy home! Or does all this sound like talk about dreamland, or a vision of the future yet to be overtaken?
If further evidence of our want of the spiritual mind is required, we have it in the fact, that the peculiar, distinguishing doctrines of the gospel are assented to rather than believed. As a dead chieftain in the camp, they inspire no awe; as an opinion about the height of the Andes, they feed the strength of no supreme conviction. But these vital truths of the gospel, such as the guilt of all men; forgiveness only through faith in the blood of Christ crucified; native depravity, and regeneration by the Holy Ghost; a day of judgment; a final and eternal separation of the righteous and the wicked, these are not dead theories, not the footballs of human speculation, but living truths for living men to confront and grapple with, ay, rather, truths to be received in mastery of the conscience and will, heart and life, of every rational creature.
And not only these, but the principles which should govern our daily life are equally ignored, if not equally offensive. We are ready to soften down the doctrines, and indulge, with many plausible excuses, the desire for personal ease and sensual gratification. Jesus said unto his disciples, " If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me." Now, where are the cross-bearers in this ease-loving, pleasure-seeking age? Are there none? yes, here and there one. But put the test just quoted, and put this further test: " If any man come to me, and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." Do you really put your Saviour before yourself? Do you consciously subordinate all family considerations to the interests of Christ's kingdom? You may decide, if you will, what spirit you are of. Dear brethren, shall we fly from this subject to something more agreeable? or shall we tremblingly put the test, and abide the issue?
Still further, keeping to our own hearts, let us examine our aims. For what, for whom, are we living? You know the Scripture: “If ye be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above." " Take no thought for the body, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, or what ye shall put on, but" think about this, do this, u seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness." Brethren, it is a fearful thing not to be in sympathy with Jesus. Are we aiming at his ends? " Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven." Now, brother, have you not been devoted for some years past, mind and heart, to material possessions and worldly pleasures? Can you claim confidence in your self knowledge, and admit any thing else? If, in all this struggling and crowding and jostling, you have been aiming to advance the cause of Christ, and, in a spirit of self-denial, serenely laying up treasure in heaven, God be praised; but have you?
We do not suppose that Christians are guilty of gross sins or inconsistencies. We take it for granted that they avoid all sharp practice, and doubtful indulgences, and open selfishness. But he who goes no further than this has a most imperfect idea of Christ, and of the believer's relation to Him. He who stops with the outward, has not even approached the Divine life; and “knows nothing as he ought to know it."
And now let us turn to look at some of the consequences of worldliness:
1. It excites the displeasure of the Lord Jesus Christ. When the Lord talked to Peter about going to Jerusalem and suffering at the hands of the chief priests and elders, and about being killed, and raised again 011 the third day, that disciple would change the subject, and avoid the predictions. But the Lord, whose heart was set on the prosperity of His kingdom, though it must prosper through self-denial and self-sacrifice, was offended with Peter, and turned His face from him with this rebuke: " Thou savorest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men." To enjoy Christ's favor, we must have His spirit. To share His fellowship, we must share his purposes. Napoleon once said, “Jerusalem is not in the line of my operations." But, if we would stand in the presence of Jesus, and enjoy His face, we must be ready to sympathize with Him in all His expectations, and go wherever He shall lead. What can compensate for the displeasure of the Lord?
2. Another result of worldliness is an utter want of confidence in the use and efficacy of the simple, essential truths of the gospel. To suffer, to die, " that be far from Thee, Lord." To rely upon the doctrines, to resort to prayer, to expect the presence and conscious influence of the Holy Ghost, " that be far from our confidence," is the practical testimony of the nominal Christian. And, instead, he relies upon mere human talent or influence or eloquence to advance the cause of Christ, and resorts to mere worldly contrivances, and panders to a depraved popular taste. As well advance the spring, and loose the streams, and clothe the valleys with golden harvests, with a fire of brush and a garden hose. How can one have confidence in spiritual powers and persons, when he has lost all spiritual perception and affinity? How can his interest be any thing but transient, or his experience any thing but shallow?
3. Another effect of worldly-mindedness is ignorance of the Holy Spirit's special presence. It must be a poetic mind to recognize the poet. It requires a spiritual mind to recognize the Spirit's presence. Christ agonized in the garden, but the disciples had not sympathy enough with Him to keep awake. He came and stood beside them, and bent over them, with words on His tongue that would have thrilled their hearts and gladdened all their future; but they were ignorant and unconscious of His presence. And that was a lost opportunity, a loss never to be made up, an occasion never to be repeated. Just so, within the last few years, the Spirit has been present again and again, present to open the Scriptures, present to quicken and comfort and convert the soul; but worldliness has held every sense fast locked in sleep. “Oh that thou hadst known the times of thy visitation!” Brethren, is it not “high time to awake out of sleep," and listen for the sound of descending wings?
4. Another effect of worldly mindedness is, that the believer is obliged to go over the whole question of his own conversion every time the Spirit is really poured out. While all are in the dark together, one man's foundation is as good as another. But, as soon as the light begins to shine, the worldly mind is in trouble. Thoughts, affections, aspirations, have been elsewhere; and now a painful want, a miserable uncertainty, is revealed. Of course, such a Christian can do no good. He has no strength, no confidence in himself. Like a beam of light, severed from the sun, separated from Christ, his light is darkness. He has no voice, no burden of prayer, for others; all his anxiety is to hear for himself, “Thy sins be forgiven thee." And thus it is, over and over again, every time the Spirit is forced upon him.
5. And hence another result is very few additions to the Church. And even those who suppose themselves converted find so little difference between the Church and the world, that they can hardly decide to change their relation. On the other hand, the young from Christian families are brought over to card-playing and wine-drinking; children spend their sabbaths, or a portion of them, where they are taught to call their fathers' faith illiberal, bigoted, puritanic; operas flourish, theatres multiply, and Christians relax their watchfulness and yield to the magnetism of pleasure, and follow their children. Behold the result! The Church as impotent as a debating society; the sharp gratifications of sense sought and enjoyed, instead of the fruits of the Spirit and the peace of God in the soul; Zion trailing her beautiful garments in the dust; and almost no conversions from the world. Again and again, the atmosphere of our worshipping assemblies seems agitated, as by the emotions of the Divine heart; but it is as when the sunshine and the dew visit the rock. There is no springing foliage, no fruit. To be sure, there are, here and there, conversions among us, and, from time to time, a few inquirers; but the appalling confession forced to the lips even then is, “The children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth."
And now, brethren, what shall be done? We must go back to the point of departure. When Bunyan's Christian got out of the way and found himself in sore trouble, his burden growing heavier instead of lighter, Evangelist told him he must go back, and enter the path to the wicketgate, where he left it. “Then did Christian address himself to go back."
And then what? How shall we prevent a repetition of this turning aside and turning back from the narrow way? We must have the love of God as the supreme and masterful affection of our soul. The love of the world must be eradicated from the heart. And this can be done only by enthroning a new spiritual affection. Chalmers's phrase, set as the title of a sermon, " The expulsive power of a new affection," contains the whole philosophy of a holy, devout Christian life. We must know this “power" in a conscious daily experience. To love God according to His character and worth is to subdue and extirpate every other affection. Then the Christian's course will be onward and upward, like the sun, and 110 more steps backward, and no more aside.
"As by the light of opening day
The stars are all concealed; So earthly pleasures fade away
When Jesus is revealed."
“Love not the world, neither the things of the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him."
4. Published by direction of the Congregational Churches of Button.