March 31

Ye are all the children of light and the children of the day. - 1 Thessalonians 5:5.

THE gospel is a system of knowledge. Hence it is called “light.” “The light of life,” “a great light,” “the light of the world.” When we think of this subject comparatively, three states with regard to knowledge present themselves to our notice. First, If we refer to the heathen, they were the children of night; all was dark with them. This was the case with these boasters of knowledge. “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools;” they were “vain in their imagination, and their fleshly hearts were dark.” If some of these philosophers had a belief in the immortality of the soul, it was “only,” as Paley said, “one of conjecture; they never taught it as a principle, never urged it as a duty.

Secondly, ‘If we turn from the heathen to the Jews, we shall find they were the children of the light. They had some light. Here was God known. “His name was great in Israel.” “To them were committed the oracles of God.” They possessed all the revelation the world then contained. But much as this was the case compared to the destitution of all around them, it was little compared with what was possessed by those who should come after them; and therefore our Saviour said to his disciples “that many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things that ye see, and have not seen them, and to hear those things that ye hear, and have not heard them.”

Therefore, Christians are the children of the light and of the day. The Jews had the types and the shadows; Christians have the realities. The Saviour was to them “afar off,” and they could not discern his lovely features, but we behold him “face to face.” To them the Sun of Righteousness was below the horizon, but upon us he has “risen with healing in his wings;” and, says the Apostle John, addressing believers, “Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and know all things;” not that we are to understand that we derive from the Scriptures a knowledge of the arts and sciences.

We do not go to the gospel for philosophy but divinity. It does not profess to teach us astronomy, but something beyond the stars. Its language is the language of Him whose words are words of “eternal life.” It is wisdom: it is the “wisdom from above;” and it is knowledge: it is the excellent “knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord.” There we know all that is necessary for us to be acquainted with as sinners: and there we find things made plain just in proportion as they are important, so that the wayfaring man may not err therein. And as the dial tells us the hours of the day by the shadow as well as by the sunshine, so shall it be found that the gospel teaches us by what we do not see as well as by what is revealed. How much may we learn from its silence, and how much wiser would some men be if, when the gospel ceases to guide them, they would choose not to advance and intermeddle with what they ought not to know, and pry into things which they have not power to discern, and which puff up the fleshly mind. But let us not forget or neglect the intelligence derived from the gospel.

Seeing that we are “children of light and of the day, let us not sleep as do others.” How lamentable it is that we, who have the Scriptures, and sabbaths, and sanctuaries, and such abundant opportunities and advantages “to grow in grace, and in the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,” should make so little proficiency. To us the words of our Lord will, we fear, be applicable: “Are ye also yet without understanding?” “Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me?”