SUNDAY READING

Gisborne Times, Volume LXV, Issue 10391, 7 May 1927, Page 8

SUNDAY READING

"THE ROD HATH BLOSSOMED.”

(By the Rev. J. Aitkcn, M.A.) And now let us take the warning of our text a Jittle more closely home to ourselves. You say it hardly ap>plies to us: we are not idolaters and wo* have nothing to do with foreign alliances. No, we- are not idolaters in the gross sense. We don't bow down to stock and stone. But there is a subtler kind of idolatry to which we are tempted. There is setting the .world, in ono aspect or another of it, in the place of God. Men do set their hearts upon the tilings which this world has to offer. There is money and there is pleasure and there are various gains and prizes, positions and satisfactions. Things that belong to the material, physical side of life—put them first m your thoughts, set your desires upon them, make them the objects o; your ambition, subordinate all else to them, and that is idolatry... And think how unkindness, dishonesties, excesses, immoralities, grow out devotion to such ends as these. Then again, how: often do men allow themselves to be .guided by the opinions and standards of the world about them! What the world condones they condone in themselves: what the world approves they approve. They lower their ideals to the level that prevails in them own set: they follow the example of their companions or at least drift into their ways. Disloyal to their own consciences, they are disloyal to God. They are entangled in foreign alliances. Nowl if a man knew no better than to make money or pleasure or selfish gratification bis goal in life there would be no blame Jlo him. But men do know better. At any rate we know better. When we act in that way, we act against the light. And in our case it is sin. But tlie warning of cur text is clear and plain. A life lived on those principles ends in ruin. The rod liatli blossomed, and disaster is sure. \\ hatkind of disaster? The worst of all kinds —spiritual disaster. Lot a man give' himself up, against his better knowledge and his better judgment, to the making of money or the[ enjoyment of pleasure, or the gratification of appetite or lust, shall Hell you what will happen to him? First of all his keen sense of right ana, 'Yvjrong will be clulled. He will cnft more and more into judging his actions and his conduct generally by the easy standards of the world. The very desire to do right will waver and his power to do j-ight will weaken. More and more the goal he has chosen for himself will dominate all his thoughts and energies. Self wel reio-11 with ever more complete control in his life. He will become more and more isolated in sympntny r.ia common interest irom liis fellow men. And in the end his character, Jus personality will fall into ruins, Lne death which is the wages of sin, is the death of character. It is J- le slow paralysis of every noble faculty. the darkening of every noble vision, the dying out of all pure happiness, the decav of all that is noble in the. soul. Tlie loss of eternal life—that is the wages of sin, the .penalty that grows out of and/ follows hard upon unfaithfulness to truth and right, unfaithfulness to God.' Mark that present tense again. The rod hath blossomed. No net'll to wait till tlie future; the penalty is present. Spiritual degeneration is already set in. The aeroplane cannot stand still: it the engine stops it immediately descends.' So if tlie spirit of man be net striving upwards in faith and endeavor, it is sinking downwards to what end God onlv knows. | have spoken of these things as plainly as I can: and I have spoken of thing* that are real. I trust 1 have made the meaning dear, "bon must apulv it to yourselves. Let me

1 aslc you this question, y hat d° 5° ! really worship? What bulxs largest i in/your thoughts, desires, ambitions . ! The world and its gifts, or God. - truth, right? What weighs most w.tii yoti, influences you most. cut opinions of \ our own set or your o-'-u clearest vision of what is I ' l S nt *. appeal to you to he true to the highest and best that you knew, lou know a hotter goal than worldly gain a <»• p.easures, a higher standard than the standard of the world. You have heard of Jesus Christ and, His king do in, of Ilis law of love and service You have heard the voice of Ghrisi bidding you turn from the world anu self to Him. You know that in Christ is the highest, ideal, the goal and perfection of all human life ami character-. Listen to that voice then ; be true to that ideal. Yield, yourse.i to the guidance and the power oi Christ, Resolve that you will be no more an idolater—-that you will In. Christ’s man and live.