AN UNMERCENARY SPIRIT.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVIII, Issue 246, 23 October 1897, Page 4 (Supplement)

AN UNMERCENARY SPIRIT.

By Canon E. E. Bernard, Salisbury

'What shall we have, therefore?'—Matt, xix., 27. I have tried to draw a picture of the unmercenary spirit which is, I fully believe, realised in more or less measure in many lives. It is, of course, very far from being commonly realised. There is a mercenary spirit abroad which asks in all these duties and relations of life, 'What shall we have, therefore?' which draws back if the question is not answered to its liking, and so loses what it might have had. ' It is surely not wonderful that it should be thus with those who have so hard a task in providing the necessaries of life. It may easily seem to them that in everything they are obliged to consider what they will get/. And our system of educationdependent so largely on prizes—fosters this disposition. It is full of contrivances for reward. lN To doubt it is very well intended, possibly it may be indispensable, but, at any rate, the result is to bring up chiklren with the idea that everything is to be paid for. It has even come to this in our day— that people expect to be paid for amusing themselves. At least, it is difficult to put any other interpretation on the long and well-stocked prize-lists which meet us in every athletic competition. Or if in some departments of activity it is not actual material rewards which are sought for, yet praise and glory are expected in newspaper paragraphs, complimentary speeches, and addresses. And if these things do not come, or are not so full as is desired, then the complaint is heard, What shall we have, therefore? As I have said, there is much excuse to be made for this attitude of mind in those who have their daily bread to earn, but there is far less excuse for those who are better off. We have enough to enable us to volunteer our services where they are wanted without thinking about remuneration. But do we do this? How often the expectation of gaining something —honour, praise, notoriety, or some social advantage—weighs with men in what they undertake for the good of others! And this is the case among those who are really rich. There, too, unless we are misinformed by those who profess to know and describe 'society,' there is a constant look-out for anequivalent: I do you a service, but I shall expect something from you. That is what is intimated, if not expressed. It is not the simple exercise of kindliness and hospitality from friend to friend and kinsman to kinsman. Yes; there is a mercenary spirit abroad among all classes, and it is not the spirit of Christ. It is the spirit of avarice, tainting or drying up altogether the spirit of love and mutual service. For to the man who has really got the spirit of love in his Heart the fact that he will probably get something- by what he is intending to do is almost enough to turn him,aside from doing it.

But, in conclusion, I am. bound to Notice that there appears to be a very serious objection to the whole of this line of thought, and it is this-—-Is not the plan of reward for service God's own way of dealing with man? And does not this legitimate it, not merely in the ordinary transactions of business, but in the rest of our conduct? .It is, indeed, true tha.t the Lord gave a gracious answer to St: Peter Avhcn he asked the question which is our text: 'Everyone that hath forsaken houses or brethren or sisters, or father or mother, or wife or children, or lands for My name's sake shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.' But what is the reward? All its lesser parts are summed up and embraced in everlasting life —life eternal. And what is this? Not somethingexternal and separate from us—not something distant and future. It is that true vitality of the soul in all its parts and powers which grows up and is developed in the man who is doing God's will and living by faith in Jesus Christ. .This is his reward even now. This prodnces that inner peace and joy, that glow of happiness "which comes over him at times. It is his new relation to God, his new spiritual caj>acities. It is not that God, as it were, pays no wages for this or that; but doing this or that by His grace raises and perfects us, makes us fit for greater things. Every time that you overcome a temptation, or do an act of compassion, you are raised and strengthened and made capable of the happiness of the life to come. Your reward is in yourself, or, more truly, in Him, in greater nearness to Him. more knowledge and more love of Him. Those who have tasted these things do not ask,with regard to their

own doings, 'What shall we have, therefore?' The true view of Christianity is not the mercenary spirit in an extended and glorified form, however much its enemies may try so to represent it, Christian life is doing the will of God, and showing love to man for the sake of doing so, and not for the sake of something else.

The true spring of action for the Christian, if we are to seek any spring, beyond the happiness of obeying and loving, is to be found in what God has done for him rather than in what God will do. God will do much. There are things which eye hath not seen and ear hath not heard. And in regard to our own nature He will make it something nobler than we can as yet conceive both in body and soul. 'It doth not yet appear what we shall be.' But there is much which the Christian has already received, and is daily experiencing more and moreforgiveness, peace, reconciliation, strength, confidence—these are ever prompting him to service. 'What he is to have' from men, or even from God, falls into the background as a motive compared with his sense of what he has already received. It is not God making ?i return to him which he thinks about, but his making a return to God. He hath called me out of darkness into His marvellous light. What reward shall I give unto the Lord for all the benefits that He hath done unto me?