SUNDAY READING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13390, 19 January 1907, Page 4 (Supplement)

SUNDAY READING.

THK FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT. BY THE V.KY. THEODORK L. CUTLER, D.U. A bountiful crop of weeds will always grow spontaneously on any neglected pieco <•>, ground. In like manner sin is spontaneous in ill.' carnal heart. The Apostle Fan! calls the roll of a very ugly brood of what he styles "the works of the flesh" in the fifth chapter of his letter to the Galatians. But wheat and corn rniis.t. Im< sown, and orchards must, he planted. Wherefore in vivid contrast to the spontaneous products of un- | regenerate hearts he specifies certain most, beautiful and precious "fruits of the I Spirit." While many talk confidently about man's self-reforming power, yet God's Word and human experience make it certain that when men have tried to reach the highest, noblest, purest spiritual life, without the aid of God's .Spirit, they have lamentably failed. i Bible religion is a. growth, a. development; j and it requires a root. That root is of i Divine origin. The root of the best, char- | acters ami the best lives i- a new spiritual j principle implanted by the Holy Ghost. j That is the meaning of regeneration. This I root, is as invisible to the eye as the root j of an apple tree: hut the tree is visiblo I with it- beautiful blossoms in May, and its bountiful fruitage in October. The inward life of the tree overhangs the boughs with innumerable apples, which the sun crimsons \ with its warm blush, and then the '" good ! tree" presents to its owner its "good fruit" as its consummated season's work. There is a striking analogy between an orchard and the true Christian Church— which is not; a monopoly of any single denomination: it i.- made up of "the faithful in Christ .Jesus.."' Christians are simply convened sinners. They have turned to God under the drawing influence of the, wondrous Divine love; and the Holy Spirit i.-. the Author of their regeneration. KVEItYTHtNG OK NOTHING. The tempt to take the supernatural out. of our religion would be as fatal as the attempt, to remove" from the skies the light and the giving warmth of the sun. God's Word meets every minister as ho enters his pulpit, and every teacher or parent who desires the conversion of a child, with tho emphatic declaration — "With the Holy Spirit everything, without the Spirit j nothing!" Every true Christian is "born of the Spirit." He is created anew in Christ Jesus. To the carnal heart sinning is a.- natural as breathing; the evidence that the heart is renewed and under a new Master is that it Irears the fruits of the Spirit. Let us go around this goodly true of Christian character and shako down a few of these apples of gold. The first one specified by the apostle is Love. It well deserves the pre-eminence. The very essence of Bible piety is to love tho Lord our God ; with all the heart and soul, and our neigh- ! hour as ourselves. Our religion ought to j ho saturated with love; it ought to breathe | cut in our every-day talk as freely as in I our prayers; it ought to ennoble a Chrisj tian's business transactions; it ought to i write his hallo! and sweeten his citizenship; | it ought to own hi- purse, and be fell in viie grasp of his hand. He who thus love? i, horn of God. The ie\i grace is .Joy: and this is as different a thing from mere jollity as the I icady sunlight is from the brief flash of [ 1 Li" lightning. J have never seen this grace ! gleam out more brightly than when carried i at the prow through a midnight tempest i of adversities. A genuine child of .Jesus Christ can sing in the dark and "rejoice lin tribulation." Can a sceptic or a worldi ling do that.' ! FINDING I'.KST. [ I'.'Mce i- in the catalog,.. of the Holy I Spirit's fruits. This is the -wee; serenity ' of a pardoned and accepted soul that has found the "rest" which Christ promised. When wicked and wayward selfishness has grounded arms in the citadel of the heart, and surrendered its will as well as its affections, Jesus says to us. ".My peace I give unto you." Worries about the transient tilings and the temporal thing- ought j to be no more disturbing than the ruffling* I j of a, light breeze on the surface of the great j deep sea.

_ Long-.-uiFering- and Ce-ntle-ness are mentioned at. twin graces. The literal meaning of the first won) is "the power of holding still under provocation." It is the rare and beautiful grace of forbearance-. Christ Jesus was its loftiest embodiment, when He breathed out on the cross that, riivinest prayer of magnanimity and patience: •'Father, forgive them-, for they know not what thev do."

Coodne.-s is philanthropy- the unselfish love of our fellow men. whatever their <a-.te, colour, or condition. It i- Christianity oil fool with a Bible in one hand and a' loaf of bread in the other— food for hungry ,-ouls and bodies, too, It is not the religion that suns itself on the warm side of a well-en-dowed church, but the practical Christ-like-ness that seeks out the lost, going down in the diving-bell of practical mission work, to brine up pearls for Christ's crown out of the slimy depths of ignorance and vice. A WKM.-LAUKN" TKEE, 15, it. this article is too brief to dwell on all the fruits of the Spirit in a consecrated life. There is Fait.li that join- the soul to .leMis and overcome, the world: and there is Meekness that chooses a humble place, esteeming other- Ix'foro itself. By no means least come- Temperance, "which means self-control for our own sake and self-denial for the sake of those who might be tempted to their own destruction.

What a glorious catalogue of fruits we have been In-holding on the well-laden nee of a godly life! What an evidence of the power of Calvary's atoning blood ami the. Corpel of redeeming lo\e! What a proof of the vital and imii-peii-abie need of the Holy Spirit, in subduing the power 0 Satan and of .-in in the heart, and in producing the genuine ami enduring graces that beautify and ble»s humanity! And what a tremendous argument for fervent, and importunate prayer for tho outpouring of the Holy. Spirit J

JOHN THK BAPTIST. RV wii.i.i LIXCOI.J.". Now. briefly to look at the contra <■■■■ havs in .John the Baptist to tile Lord. "And this i- the record of John, when the dewsent priests and I.cvitos from Jerusalem to ask him. Who art thou?" Tiii-i -'''in- to have been a formal, official. influential deputation from tie- headquarters of religious society. Tier" was nothing like thai to the embosomed ' >:;<•. nothing. Whilst a poor, human mium r had honour heaped upon him—tin- cmbo.-omed One received none. "And lit- confessed, and denied not: hut confessed, 1 am not tin- Christ." It is a- if they were willing to receive hint a- such, willing to receive any rather than t : :- >•■'!. And it was grace given to John to make such a noble confession. And I think Cod impliedly commends him: we mtiy infer ii from the somewhat peculiar txpre-sion.

"Me confessed and denied not. but confessed." S> he had the choice of two—the world's e-.teem. in thinking him to be the Christ: or (Sod*- prai-e, in donving and confessing. And do you think be was a [col in choosing the prai-e of Cod before the praise of mortal men"' The loude.-t prai-o ever lavished upon anyone by mortal men i- a- nothing to be compared with the smile of de-it- and the praise of Cod. " Ami they ~-ked them. What then? Alt th- ■ Klin.-? And he said. I am not. Art thou that prophet ': And he answered. No. Then .-aid they unto him. Who art thou'.' that we may give an an-wer to them that sent. us. What -ave-t thou of thyself? Ho said, "I am a voice."' Not "the" voice. And the word "am" the Holy (ihost omit-. He presses it so much about Christ, bin leaves it out about John. "I— \oic\"

Now. remember that the Holv him i has called Jesus "the Word," and 'now He says of John the Baptist, " I—a voice." Th - do we get a distinction between the em bosomed One am! John the Baptist. V, • - think with word--, it is impossible to think without them. Cod had thoughts, we may he -me, ami Christ, was there. Christ ithe outcome, the thought oxnrosse,], the word spoken. So, too. is He "called Widow, the word unnttered. Christ is the Word, and was then in the l*>-om before H>came out from Cod. in the beginning. I'm. a voice has no existence until it has come out: a word has. I think first with word-, and then, when I have thought, 1 may tell it in my own time or no. 1 love -loin, tin Baptist, for in comparison with Christ he put himself in the light place. Would to Cod that His servants did so now. People love to magnify men, to clii around what; they can see. Oh. to put the Lord in Rir place. "Worship thou Him."