George H. Morrison's Old And Beautiful Devotions

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November 3

The Tactfulness of Love

And this I pray, that your love may abound…in all judgment— Phi_1:9

Tact—the Grace of Touching Others Gently

The word that is here used for judgment is a very interesting word. It occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. Its primary signification was perception by any of the senses, but gradually it got specialized into perception by the sense of touch. And so, rising into higher spheres (for words have their own moral history), it came to mean what we describe as tact. Tact is the same word as touch. Tact is the kind of way in which we touch things, but not in a material sense like wood or stone. It is the unseen substance of which life is made with its sensibilities and shrinking, its strange and instantaneous reactions. Such contacts we are forced to make in every period of life. Our years are spent in ceaseless interaction with the lives of other people. And whenever we learn to touch these other lives delicately and understandingly, then we possess the charming grace of tact.

Tact Grows with the Deepening of Love

Now it is notable that Paul connects this grace with the growth and deepening of love. When love abounds, it inevitably blossoms into all kinds of delicate perception. These Philippians to whom he wrote seem, happily, to have been ignorant of heresy. But they were very ready to misunderstand each other; there was a good deal of social bitterness in Philippi. The grace they lacked, sometimes without ever meaning it, was that interior delicacy which would not hurt or irritate another. There are many people who mean well yet are always rubbing others the wrong way. Often they are quite unconscious of it and never dream of the hurt that they are causing. And one can gather from this letter that in Philippi, for all its orthodoxy, there was a good deal of that social unpleasantness. Paul was perfectly aware of that. He had his hand on the pulse of all his churches. He saw how it spoiled the joy and peace and harmony that ought to reign and rule among the saints. And the notable thing is he does not waste his time in exhorting his children to a greater tactfulness—he prays that they may have a greater love. He goes right down to the heart of things. He fixes his attention on the center. Let love have a controlling place, and the touch will become infinitely delicate. What to avoid, what not to say or do, that is not a secret of the intellect; it is always a secret of the heart.

You Are Tactful with What You Love

This tactfulness of love is apparent in many different spheres. Watch a botanist handling a flower—you can tell that he loves it by the way he touches it. Look at a mother with her little baby—her very touch reveals the mother-heart. I can often tell if a young fellow loves books, not by the clever way in which he speaks of them, but by the way in which he handles them. Let a rough, coarse man once love a woman, and it is amazing how tactful he becomes. He begins to divine, by the genius of the heart, the delicate attentions she is longing for. For there are little acts of courtesy and grace that mean far more than any gold or silver to such as may be sensitively inclined. It is always a sure mark that love is dying when tact takes to itself wings and flies away. When the delicate perceptions disappear, it is a token that the heart is hardening. And that is the tragedy of many lives, not the blighting touch of infidelity, but the roughened touch (so rough that it may hurt) which betrays the decadence of love.

Tactfulness Is Different from Diplomacy

In its roots as well as in its fruits, true tact differs from diplomacy. I would venture to say that tact is always spurious when it is not rooted in the soil of love. There is a kind of tact that springs from fear, though no one ever may suspect its origin. It shuns offense, not for the sake of love, but because offending might prove perilous. The eye may be fixed, not on the other person, but on one's own quietness or prosperity, either of which may be endangered by the rough or ill-considered touch. True tact is different from that. It owns no kinship with cowardice at all. It is one of the finest flowerings of love; it is the exquisite perception of the heart. That is why Christian tact so far surpasses anything the world had ever known in any of the religions of antiquity. The gospel has done tremendous service in the education of the heart. Giving it at last a worthy motive, it has released the hidden capacities of loving. And so doing, it has poured a wealth of meaning into the gracious tactfulness of love.

The Tactfulness of Our Lord

Nowhere do we find this tactfulness of love so perfectly revealed as in our Lord. The infinite delicacy of His touch is the measure of His loving heart. When the leper cried for healing, we read that the Lord touched him; it was not alone His hand that touched him, it was a yearning and redeeming love. That lonely, isolated soul got far more than the cleansing of his leprosy: he got the glad assurance of a Friend. Christ had an exquisite way of understanding people, of handling them with unexampled delicacy, of avoiding what might vex or irritate. And all this sprang not from a quick intellect, priding itself on knowing human nature, but from the depth and wonder of His love. That was where Paul learned his lesson. That taught him what to pray for. It was no use praying for a finer tact unless first there was a fuller love. First the roots, and then the fruits. First the deepening, and then the delicacy. First the dew of heaven on the heart—and tactfulness blossoms as the rose.

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

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November 4

The Subjugation of Our Higher Longings

Having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better. Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you— Phi_1:23-24

Paul's Love for Christ

One cannot wonder that the Apostle Paul had a desire to depart and to be with Christ. He longed for the consummation of his fellowship. Whatever difficulty there may be in reconciling Paul's views of the beyond, there can be no question that central to them all was the thought of personal fellowship with Christ. And in the Roman prison with its inactivities and its long hours for quiet meditation, that longing grew imperious and dominant. Death had no terrors for him. It was the swift passage to a full communion. It would unveil for him the well-beloved face of the Savior to whom he owed his life. He was not "half in love with an easy death," but he was passionately in love with Him into whose presence death would usher him. This was the deepest longing of his soul—to be with Christ which was far better. His highest ambition was to win that intimacy which would be uninterrupted and complete. He longed for the hour when, through the gate of death, he would pass into the presence of that Lord who had so marvelously rescued and redeemed him.

Paul's Burden for His Converts

But on that great loving heart of his, Paul bore forever the burden of his converts. He was their one spiritual father, and he loved them as a father loves his children. There comes a time in the life of growing children when they emerge from the control of fatherhood. Trained and disciplined, they stand on their own feet now and fight their own battles with the world. But Paul's children were only infants yet in constant need of guidance and advice which nobody but he could ever give them. Thus it was that, through his highest longing, there broke the tender urgings of apostleship. Sweet would it be to see his blessed Lord—but what would all his little children do? Bereft of him and of his loving counsel, in a crooked and perverse generation, would they ever come to maturity of faith? To Paul that consideration was determinative. It laid a masterful hand on his desires. His yearning love for the souls which God had given him must be regulative of his deepest life. And so, in the interests of his own who leaned on him and needed him so utterly, this great heart rose to the lofty heroism of subduing the highest longing of his soul.

Discipleship Involves Renouncing Our Higher Longings

Now very often in the Christian life there comes a difficult issue such as that. The struggle is not waged around our worst; it emerges on the levels of our best. That there are lower longings the Christian must subdue is one of the primary findings of discipleship. This is in no sense self-repression, for sin is not of the essence of the self. Often the hardest moral problem meets us, not when called to subjugate the lower, but when summoned to subjugate the higher. Just as the sorest decisions that may face us are not always between right and wrong but are sometimes, in this intricate life of ours, between the competing claims of right and right; so not infrequently the hardest thing in life is not the conquering of our lower longings, but the quiet and lovely renouncing of our higher. Beautiful things we have set our heart upon, dreams we have long cherished, spiritual ambitions that have been our intimates since first we passed from darkness into light—to let these go, quietly to yield them up when the finger of God points us to another road, that is one of life's most lofty heroism's. So was it with the apostle in his prison. His whole soul longed to be with Christ. That (for the Greek is stronger than the English) was a very great deal better. And then in his fatherly yearning for his converts who leaned so hard on him and loved him so, he subjugated the longing to depart.

Renunciation of Higher Longings Comes in Different Guises

This higher spiritual renunciation may come to men in very different guises. It
is various as the complexity of life. It may present itself to the young woman longing to give herself to Christian work, yet with little motherless children in the home entirely dependent on her care. It may face the young fellow in business whose fondest ambition is to be a minister, but whose business is the one support of a frail mother or an invalid sister. Many a young disciple has longed with all her heart to serve on the foreign mission field, and then the unmistakable pointing of God's finger has indicated another road for her. And perhaps no struggle she ever had with sin was so bitter as the sweet acceptance of a lowlier and more homely lot. It is hard to part sometimes with lower cravings; it is often even harder to part with higher ones—to lay our spiritual ambitions down at the call of simple duty or of love. And it is always a great thing to remember that the saints of God have shared in that experience and been perfectly familiar with its bitterness. Here was Paul, a prisoner in Rome. His great desire was to be with Christ. The deep, passionate longing of his soul was to get home, that he might see his Savior. And nothing is finer in that noble heart of his than the subjugation of that higher longing for the sake of those who loved him and who needed him.

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

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November 5

The Form of a Servant

He took upon him the form of a servant— Phi_2:7

Slaves and Servants

On one occasion our Lord announced "I am among you as one who serveth." That was the summation of His ministry. The word for serveth which St. John gives us is a word of very large and liberal meaning. It includes services of every kind, however high or exalted they may be. But when St. Paul says of that same Lord that He took on Him the form of a servant, that is an entirely different word. It is the common term for slave, or, as we might put it, for a domestic servant. There was nothing of lofty ministry about it; it was colored with contemptuous suggestion. Paul was thinking of his home in Tarsus where, unregarded and unthanked, the slaves were busy in menial occupations. No one knew better than the great apostle that life in its last analysis is service. The Grecian statesman and the Roman general were the servants of commonwealth or empire. But what awed Paul when he thought of Christ was not that He was found in such a category. It was that He humbled Himself to the likeness of a slave. There is a service which is highly honorable. It is compatible with great position. I have a postcard I once got from Mr. Gladstone, and it is signed "Your obedient servant." But the slave's service was of another order, quite apart from honorable ministries, and in that lay the wonder of the Lord. The slave legally had no possessions, and He had not where to lay His head. No freeman acknowledged a slave in public places, and from Him men hid, as it were, their faces. The slave was universally despised, and his master could maltreat him as he pleased. And He was despised of men and, being maltreated, opened not His mouth.

Even in Childhood He Took on the Form of a Servant

This aspect of the Lord's obedience constitutes the wonder of His childhood. It explains as it illuminates the strange silence of the Gospel story. There are apocryphal gospels of the infancy that credit the little Boy with various miracles. He strikes a comrade who instantly falls dead; He makes clay sparrows and they fly away. But the real wonder of the childhood does not lie in miracles like these, but in this, that even in His boyhood He took on Him the form of a servant. Did Mary never ask Him in the morning to go and fetch the water from the well? Did she never say, "Child, I'm very tired today, will you run to the village shop and take a message?" And the beautiful way in which He did such bidding was a far more wonderful thing to seeing eyes than any reported miracles on sparrows. He, the eternal Son of God, running little errands for His mother; He, who might have grasped equality with God, lighting the cottage fire and fetching water—that was the astounding thing to Paul, as it was to all of the evangelists, as is so clear from their majestic silence.

In the Practice of Carpentry Jesus Took on the Form of a Servant

Or, again, we think of these long years when He was the carpenter of Nazareth. And once again legend has been busy seeking to give content to these years. Strange stories soon grew current of amazing things that had happened in that workshop. Beams had been miraculously lengthened, and ploughs, in a moment, miraculously made. But to all this, in the inspired evangelists, there is not even a reference in passing. For them the abiding wonder lay elsewhere. Do any of my readers keep a shop? Don't they know how hard it is to serve their customers ? Aren't some of these customers very hard to please and often irritating and unreasonable? And one may be certain if it is so in Britain where at least the atmosphere is Christian, it would be worse in uneducated Nazareth. The carpenter was at the beck and call of everybody. There was no pleasing some of the folk in Nazareth. It was a thankless and often humiliating service, that of a carpenter in a provincial village. And to Paul the wonder of these years was not the miraculous lengthening of beams. It was the stooping to a drudgery like that. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Christ was the brightness of His Father's glory, and the express image of His person. And then Paul thought of the carpenter's shop at Nazareth with its exacting and uneducated customers and wrote, He took on Him the form of a servant.

In His Public Ministry Jesus Took the Form of a Servant

In the public ministry, again, there is one incident which illuminates our text. It is an hour the world will not willingly let die. In the East it was one of the duties of the slave to wash the feet of the arriving traveler. For men wore only sandals then and the highways (save in rain) were very dusty. And Peter at any rate never could forget how once, and very near the end, the Master had done that office of the slave. Would he not be certain to tell that to Paul when they talked together, as we know from the Acts they did? Would not Peter enact it and draw back his feet to show Paul what had actually happened? Perhaps it was then there flashed into Paul's mind the magnificent daring of our text coupling the Lord of heaven with a menial slave. Jesus, knowing that He was come from God and went to God, girded Himself and washed the disciples' feet. He did it not forgetting His divinity. He did it because He knew He was divine. Brooding on which, Paul took his pen and wrote, "Who being in the form of God, took on him the form of a servant."

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

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November 6

Living Dangerously

Epaphroditus, my brother and companion in labor, and fellow soldier…for the work of Christ he was nigh unto death, not regarding his life (Greek gambling with his life)— Phi_2:25-30

Who Was Epaphroditus?

All we know of Epaphroditus is told us in this letter. He is one of those brave souls who leap into the light in connection with the imprisonment of Paul. It has been thought that he might be identified with the Epaphras of the Colossian epistle. But even if the names be one, such identification is improbable. It is scarcely thinkable that the pastor of Colossae should be so associated with a church in Europe as to be made its delegate to Paul. It is as a delegate we hear of him. For that perilous office he had volunteered. He had undertaken to convey to Paul the offerings of the Philippian Church. And of the risks involved in such a journey and in visiting a suspect and a prisoner, we have sundry hints in the apostle's words. No compulsion had driven Epaphroditus. He had taken all the hazards cheerfully. The strain of it all had told on him so terribly that he was brought down to the gates of death. And the point to note is how the great apostle "grappled him to his soul with hoops of steel," and spoke of him in terms of loftiest eulogy.

Risks Immortalized Epaphroditus and Paul

It is a very interesting word which Paul uses when he says that Epaphroditus "did not regard" his life. It is a word from the language of the gambler. In the long hours of his imprisonment, Paul had narrowly watched his Roman guards. He had heard them talking about boxing matches; he had been a spectator when they played at dice. And as he saw them gambling with their money and taking risks in a reckless way, his thoughts went winging to Epaphroditus. That was the kind of thing which he had done. He had deliberately gambled with his life. For Christ's sake and for the Church's sake he had flung caution to the winds of heaven. And that loving and self-forgetting recklessness so stirred the gallant heart of the apostle that Epaphroditus is immortalized. Had he played for safety he would have stayed at home. He would have pled the urgencies of work at Philippi. Probably his health was none too good, and he had doctor's orders against going. But Epaphroditus took the risks—lived dangerously—gambled with his life—and so lives within the Word of God forever.

One understands how the great heart of Paul clave so closely to Epaphroditus. The spirit of that inconspicuous delegate was the spirit which burned in his own breast. Like all great missionaries, Paul did not dwell on dangers. He only spoke of them when he was forced to. In his tremendous eagerness to spread the Gospel, he almost forgot the risks that he was running. But if ever a man gambled with his life, lived dangerously, and took the hazard, it was the great apostle to the Gentiles. He, too, might have played for safety. He might have advanced a score of reasons for it. That lacerating and gnawing thorn, for instance, would not that justify the nicest caution? But Paul forgot his caution and took risks that well might have appalled the strongest heart in the ardor of his love for the Lord Jesus. The love of Christ constrained him. He lived dangerously for the Lord. The motto of Paul was never "Safety first"; from the beginning to the end it was "Christ first." That was why he found a kindred spirit in this obscure delegate from Philippi who would have nothing to do with self-regarding caution, but for love's sake gambled with his life.

The Holy Spirit Gives Courage

This lofty disregard of self is inherent in all Christian service. A certain joy in living dangerously is one of the first-fruits of the Spirit. In the upper chamber, before Pentecost, the disciples were very careful of their lives. The doors were shut for fear of the Jews. They trembled at every step upon the stair. But when the Holy Spirit came on them in power, there was a kind of reckless gaiety about them which made men think that they were filled with wine. The doors were no longer barred now. They did not jump at every mounting footstep. That mighty rushing wind which swept the chamber somehow had swept their caution right away. They were ready to take any risks now, in the spiritual baptism of Pentecost, and like this delegate, they gambled with their lives. Later on we read of two of them that "men took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus." And what was it that carried this conviction? It was the defiant boldness of the two. Heedless of safety, imperiling their liberty, they proclaimed the resurrection of the Lord—and men took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus. The strange thing is that one of the two was Peter—and immediately we remember the denial. Peter had played for safety then. To save his skin he had almost lost his soul. Now, in the power of Pentecost, that same Peter was sublimely reckless. He was living dangerously for his Lord. All great servants have had that spiritual mark. St. Francis had it when he had kissed the leper. Luther had it when he would go to Worms though devils were thick as the tiles upon the house-tops. And nobody, however quiet his sphere, is ever thoroughly equipped for service unless, like Epaphroditus and the rest of them, he is prepared to gamble with his life. I have heard of ministers who were afraid to visit where there was fever or diphtheria or smallpox. I have even known of them being dissuaded from it by loving members of their congregations. Doubtless Epaphroditus was besought so by those who prized his ministry at Philippi; but he that saveth his life shall lose it.

Leaps into the Dark Inevitable in the Life of Action

This holds also of the life of intellect as certainly as of the life of action. To live by faith is always to live dangerously. My old professor, Lord Kelvin, once said in class a very striking thing. He said that there came a point in all his great discoveries when he had to take a leap in the dark. And nobody who is afraid of such a leap from the solid ground of what is demonstrated will know the exhilaration of believing. To commit ourselves unreservedly to Christ is just the biggest venture in the world. And the wonderful thing is that when, with a certain daring, we take Lord Kelvin's leap into the dark, we discover it is not dark at ail, but life abundant, and liberty, and peace.

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

Dist. Worldwide in the Great Freeware Bible Study package called
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November 7

The Power of the Resurrection

That I may know…the power of his resurrection— Phi_3:10

The Fact Versus the Power

Of the fact of the resurrection, Paul had not a shadow of a doubt. It was one of his indubitable certainties. He himself had had a revelation of the Lord which had altered the whole tenor of his life. He had known and conversed with those who saw Him in the days that followed upon Easter morning. Whatever might be doubtful to his intellect or might remain a matter of conjecture, his life, both of experience and thought, was based upon the fact that Christ was risen. But the power of a fact is to be distinguished from the fact itself. The power is the influence it exercises in its various relationships to life. And so the power of the resurrection is not the power that raised Christ from the dead, but the increasing pressure upon life of the stupendous fact that Christ is risen. To penetrate more fully into this, to grasp it in its infinite significance, that was the ambition of St. Paul as he made his lonely way among the mysteries. Like some bright star the fact was always shining. It was unalterable and unsetting. His passion was to know the power of the fact.

One thinks, for instance, of its evidencing power. The resurrection was the seal of heaven. In it the stupendous claims of Jesus were guaranteed and ratified of God. The dark hours when He lay buried were to the disciples hours of anguish. They could not reconcile that last indignity with the magnificence of His spiritual program. It must have seemed to them, and seemed to everybody, as if all that they had shared in was a dream now quenched forever by the grave. The fact of death extinguished all their hopes. It invalidated every claim of Jesus. It brought down into a hopeless ruin the building they had thought to be of God. And the first great power of the resurrection, its primary influence upon thought and life, was the power to scatter the agonizing doubts that filled the breasts of those who trusted Him. It gave beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for mourning. It guaranteed the Messiahship of Jesus. It flooded with the authority of heaven the vocation of their blessed Lord. That was why, in the earliest Christian preaching, there was such impassioned and unswerving emphasis on the resurrection of the Savior. It was not an isolated fact. Isolated facts are quite inoperative. It was a fact fraught with a tremendous influence on the whole concept of the Lord. Every word He spoke and every claim He made was charged with new and heavenly significance under the power of the resurrection.

The Resurrection Provided the Intimacy of a Living Friend

Or one thinks again of its sustaining power amid the tasks and burdens of mortality. It gave to men, wherever they might wander, the near presence of a living Friend. The soul thirsts for a living God, and the heart thirsts for a living friend—for one who knows and understands and loves in the intimacy of a present fellowship. And the power of the resurrection is that it answers that steady yearning of the heart in a way no memories can ever do. It gives us a Friend who is alive, closer than breathing, nearer than hands or feet. It confronts our lives not with the storied past, but with One who lives and loves us to the uttermost. And the best of all is that this living Friend has sounded all the depths of human life and has "come smiling from the world's great snare uncaught." What the law could never do for Paul was done victoriously by the risen Savior. In fellowship with Him he triumphed, and when he was weak then he was strong. His one passion was to know more fully the resources of that living Friend. That was the power of His resurrection.

The Resurrection Provided for Paul a Pull for Things Above

Or one thinks of its exalting power which was never absent from the apostle's thought. The spiritual power of the resurrection is its steady upward pull upon the life. When one is climbing in our Scottish highlands, there are often places perilous to negotiate. In such places it is a mighty succor when someone above reaches down a helping hand. And the mystical thought that Christ was gripping him from the upper security of heavenly places turned the apostle into a daring climber on the steeps that lead to God. Christ was above him—He was risen. He was stooping down to lift the climber up. Paul felt the urge of the true mountaineer which lies in seeking the things which are above. But for him there was the splendid certainty that he was not going to perish for before him and above him there was Christ. In union with Him there was an upward pull. Paul turned his back upon the lower things. Just because Christ was risen and above him, he must gain in Christ the heights of holy living. Had you asked the apostle, I think he would have answered that that was the dominant thought within his breast when he wrote of the power of His resurrection.

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

Dist. Worldwide in the Great Freeware Bible Study package called
e-Sword by Rick Meyer: http://www.e-sword.net/downloads.html
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(The goal of Rick Meyer is to distribute excellent Bible Study
Software to every country on earth in their own language FREE
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November 8

The Discipline of Thought - Page 1
by George H. Morrison

Think on these things— Phi_4:8

Two Unseen Worlds

When we speak of unseen things, we commonly refer to things that are eternal. We associate the unseen with the world beyond the veil where the angels of God, innumerable, are around the throne. Now it is true that that is an unseen world though the time is coming when our eyes shall see it, but we must never forget that far nearer to us than that there is another world which also is unseen. We live in a day of very strange discoveries and look on many things that were once invisible. By means of our telescopes we see very distant stars, and we can watch the beating of our hearts. But the world of thought, of feeling, of passion and of desire—that world still baffles the finest powers of vision; as surely as there is an unseen heaven above us, there is an unseen universe within. What a mysterious and strange thing is life—a burning point, and round it what a shadow! How utterly must a man fail who walks by sight and who will not recognize the all-embracing mystery! Deep calleth unto deep wherever man is—the invisible deep within to the unseen depths beyond. It is one distinguishing feature of the Gospel that it never makes light of these great and awful things.

Let us turn to the world within, our thoughts. For I believe that most of us give far too little heed to what I might call the discipline of thought. "If there be any virtue, or any praise, think on these things." First, I shall speak on the vital need there is of governing our thoughts. Next, on how the Gospel helps men to this government.

The Government of Our Thoughts

First, then, on the government of our thoughts—and at the outset I would recognize the difficulty of it. I question if there is a harder task in all the world than that of bringing our thoughts into subjection to our will. It is very difficult to regulate our actions, yet there is a social pressure on our actions. It is supremely difficult to order our speech aright, yet speech is restrained and checked by countless barriers. Every time we act and every time we speak we come into direct contact with society, and prudence and self-love and reputation and business interests admonish us instantly to walk with caution. But thought is free—at least we think it is. It is transacted in a world where none can observe it. The law cannot reach us for unclean imaginations. Think how we will of a man, he cannot charge us with libel. All the prudential safeguards which God has set on speech, and all the deterrent motives which surround our deeds, are lacking when we enter the silent halls of thought. It is that—perhaps above all other things—which makes the management of thought so difficult. It is the secrecy—the absence of restraint—the imagined freedom of the world within. And yet there are one or two considerations I can bring before you that will show you how, in the whole circle of self-mastery, there is nothing more vital than the mastery of thought.

Much of Our Happiness Depends on Thought

Think, for example, how much of our happiness—our common happiness—depends on thought. We begin by imagining it depends on outward things, but we all grow to be wiser by and by. "There's nothing either good or bad," says Shakespeare, "but thinking makes it so." Now of course that is only half a truth. There are things that in themselves are forever good, and there are other things that eternally and everywhere are bad—never be juggled out of these moral certainties. But in between these everlasting fixities there lies a whole world of life and of experience, and what it shall mean for us—how we shall regard it—depends almost entirely upon thought. Our happiness does not depend on what we view. Our happiness depends on our point of view. There are men who can think themselves any day into a paradise, and others who think themselves into a fever. Have we not known or met or read of men and women who seemed to have everything this world could give, yet only to look at their faces or their portraits was to read the story of frustration and discontent? But St. Francis of Assisi, the sweetest of all saints, sitting down to dine by the roadside on a few crusts of bread, was so exquisitely and radiantly happy that he could not find words enough for thankfulness. That then is an integral part of happiness—the discipline and the government of our thoughts. Basically, it is not things themselves, it is our thoughts about them, that constitute the gentle art of being happy.

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The Discipline of Thought - Page 2
by George H. Morrison

The Unconscious Influence of Our Thoughts

Again I want you to consider this—how much of our unconscious influence lies in our thoughts. Not only by what we do and what we say, but by the kind of thoughts we are cherishing in secret, do we impress ourselves upon our neighbors and help or hinder the little world we move in. That very suggestive and spiritual writer, Mr. Maeterlinck, puts the matter in his own poetic way. He says, "Though you assume the face of a saint, a hero or a martyr, the eye of the passing child will not greet you with the same unapproachable smile, if there lurk within you an evil thought." Now probably there is a little exaggeration there; one thought, flashing and then expelled, may not reveal itself. The totality of saintly character is too great to be overborne by the intrusion of one shadow of the devil. But it is certain that by the thoughts we harbor and let ourselves dwell upon and cherish in the dark, we touch and turn and influence our world when we never dream that we are doing it. There is nothing hidden that shall not be revealed—what a depth there is in that one word of Jesus! He is not merely thinking of God's judgment bar tomorrow. He is thinking of the undetected revelation of today. Christ recognized that the kind of thing we brood on, the kind of thought we allow ourselves to think, though it never utter itself in actual words, or clothe itself in the flesh and blood of deeds, encompasses and affects the life of others like a poisonous vapor or like a breath of spring. Your secret is not such a secret as you think. Why are men drawn to you? Why are men repelled by you? Why is it that sometimes we instinctively shrink from people in the very first hour that we meet them? It is because the heart—more powerful than any x-ray—deciphers for itself the secret story, brushes past speech and deed into the hidden place and apprehends the existence that is there. To think base thoughts is a sin against our neighbor as surely as it is a sin against ourselves. To be unclean even in imagination is to make it harder for others to be good. In the interests of our influence then, no less than of our happiness, you see the need of governing our thoughts.

The Power of Thought in Our Temptations

There is only one other consideration that I would mention, and that is the power of thought in our temptations. In the government of thought—in the power to bring thought to heel—lies one of our greatest moral safeguards against sin. You have all read the words of Thomas A Kempis in that immortal book, "The Imitation of Christ." They occur in his thirteenth chapter, Of Resisting Temptation. How does sin reach us? That is his question—and this is his never-to-be-forgotten answer to it: "For first there cometh to the mind a bare thought of evil, then a strong imagination thereof, afterwards delight and evil motion, then consent." First, a bare thought—that is the beginning, and it is then that the government of thought means heaven or hell. For if a man has disciplined himself to crush that thought—which may come to the purest and holiest mind—still better, if he has acquired the power to change the current and to turn his thought instantly into other and nobler channels, temptation is baffled at its very start and the man stands upon his feet victorious. A man will never regulate his passions who has never learned to regulate his thoughts. If we cannot master our besetting thoughts, we shall never master our besetting sins. I think you see, then, that in the interests of morality no less than in the interests of our happiness and influence, it is supremely necessary that we all give heed to the great subject of thought—discipline.

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[nChrist]

The Discipline of Thought - Page 3
by George H. Morrison

How the Gospel Helps in Governing Our Thoughts

So now in the second place, I wish to ask how the Gospel helps us to that. I wish to ask why a Christian above all other men has powers available for governing his thought. To some of you the mastery of thought may seem impossible—it is never viewed as impossible in Scripture, and the secret of that Gospel-power lies in the three great words—light, love, life.

Think first of light as a power for thought-mastery. We all know how light affects our thoughts. In twilight or darkness what sad thoughts come thronging, which the glory of sunlight instantly dispels. I have a dear friend who is a terrible sufferer and who rarely has any quiet sleep after three in the morning, and the worst of wakening then, he tells me, is that that is just the time when everything seems melancholy, cheerless, hopeless. We need the light if we are to see things truly. We need the light if we are to think aright. And the glory of Christ is that by His life and death He has shed a light where before there was only darkness. What had the old and beautiful religion of the Greeks to say when a man was confronted by sorrow or disease? It was dumb, it turned away its head in silence; it had no light to shed upon the mystery—till men, having no light to think by, lost all thought-control and wandered into a labyrinth of evil. But the sufferings of Christ have shed a light on suffering. The death of Christ has shed a light on death. Faced by the worst now and called to bear the cross, we can think bravely and luminously of it all. The light of Christ, for the man who lives in it, is an untold help in the government of thought.

Then think of love—Is it not one mark of love that our thoughts always follow in its train? A love that never thought about the loved one would be the most heartless and hopeless of all mockeries. A man who is deeply in love with a good woman thinks of her every hour of the day, and there is no such certain sign of love's decay as the dying out of gentle and sweet thoughtfulness. That sign a woman instantly detects—it is the unuttered tragedy of countless lives—and the sorrow of it springs from the intuition that thought is under the mastery of love. Do you see then how the Gospel helps us to thought-control? At the very center of its message it puts love. It shows us a Savior who lived and died for us and who stretches out His pierced hands towards us. It speaks of Gethsemane and Calvary and at its burning heart reveals a love that passes the love of women. "Simon son of Jonas, lovest thou me?"—that will determine the current and trend of thought. That master-passion is the power of God for bringing every thought into captivity. If the love of a woman can control and purge our thoughts, how much more the love of Jesus Christ!

Then think of life—are not our thoughts affected by the largeness and abundance of our lives? When life is poor and feeble, base thoughts scent us out as the vultures of the desert scent out the dying traveler. Half of the vile or bitter thoughts we think are the children of our lusterless and unprofitable days. Expand the horizon—get a new breath of life —and they take to themselves wings and fly away. Now what did Christ say about His coming? I am come that they might have life, and have it more abundantly. Life is expanded and filled with undreamed-of fullness when we live in the glad fellowship of Jesus. And that great tide of life, like the tide of the sea that covers up the mudbanks, is the greatest power in the moral world for submerging every base and bitter thought. Do you know anything of that light—that love—that life? What a great deal we miss in ignoring Jesus Christ! The king's daughter is all beautiful within—just because her king is her Redeemer.

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

Dist. Worldwide in the Great Freeware Bible Study package called
e-Sword by Rick Meyer: http://www.e-sword.net/downloads.html
Full Featured - Outstanding - Completely FREE - No Strings Attached

(The goal of Rick Meyer is to distribute excellent Bible Study
Software to every country on earth in their own language FREE
of charge, and that goal gets closer by the day.)
____________________

[nChrist]

November 9

How to Control Your Thoughts

"Those things…do"— Phi_4:9

The Power of Our Thoughts

We are all familiar with the difference that is made by the thoughts that arise within our hearts. Often they cast a shadow on our universe. A man may waken in the morning singing and address himself cheerfully to duty, and then, suddenly, some unbidden thought may creep or flash into his mind—and in a moment the heavens become cloudy and the music of the morning vanishes and there is fret and bitterness within.

Things have not altered in the least. Everything is as it was an hour ago. The burden of the day has not grown heavier, nor has anybody ceased to love us. Yet all the world seems different, and the brightness has vanished from the sky under the tyranny of intruding thoughts.

No one can achieve serenity who does not practice the control of thought. You cannot build a lovely house out of dirty or discolored bricks. The power of our thoughts is so tremendous over health and happiness and character that to master them is moral victory.

A Moral Task

This mastery of our thoughts is difficult, but then everything beautiful is difficult. The kind of person I have no patience with is the person who wants everything made easy. When an artist paints a lovely picture, he does that by a process of selection. Certain features of the landscape he rejects; other aspects he welcomes and embraces. And if to do that even the man of genius has to scorn delights and live laborious days, how can we hope without the sternest discipline to paint beautiful pictures in the mind?

So is it with the musician when he plays for us some lovely piece of music. Years of training are behind the melody that seems to come rippling from his fingers. And if he has to practice through hard hours to produce such melody without, how can we hope, without an equal effort, to create a like melody within?

There are two moral tasks that seem to me supremely difficult and yet supremely necessary. One is the redemption of our time; the other is the mastery of our thoughts. Probably most of us, right on to the end, are haunted by a sense of failure in these matters. But the great thing is to keep on struggling.

We see, too, how difficult this task is when we compare it with mastery of speech. If it be hard to set a watch upon our lips, it is harder to set a watch upon our thoughts. All speech has social reactions, and social prudence is a great deterrent. If you speak your mind, you may lose your position, possibly you may lose your friend. But thought is hidden—it is shrouded—it moves in dark and impenetrable places; it has no apparent social reactions. A man may be thinking bitter thoughts of you, yet meet you with a smile upon his face. A typist may inwardly despise her boss, yet outwardly be a model of obedience. It is this secrecy, this surrounding darkness, that has led men to say that thought is free, and that makes the mastery of thought so difficult.

Think on These Things

Now, the fine thing in the New Testament is this, that while it never calls that easy which is difficult, it yet proclaims that the mastery of thought is within the power of everybody. Think, for instance, of the Beatitude "Blessed are the pure in heart." Whenever our Lord says that anything is blessed, He wants us to understand that it is possible. Yet no man can have purity of heart, as distinguished from purity of conduct, who is not able to grapple with his thoughts. Again by our thoughts we shall be judged—that is always implied in the New Testament. Christ came and is going to come again, "that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed."

But I refuse to believe that men are to be judged by anything that lies beyond their power—to credit that would make the judge immoral. Then does not the great apostle say, "If there be any virtue...think on these things?" It would be mockery to command us to think if the controlling of our thoughts were quite beyond us. It may be difficult, as fine things always are, but the clear voice of the Word of God proclaims that it is within the capacity of all.

If, then, someone were to ask me how is a man to practice this great discipline, remembering the experience of the saints, I think I should answer in some such way as this: You must summon up the resources of your will. You must resist beginnings. You must remember the most hideous of sins is to debauch the mind.

You must fill your being so full of higher interests that when the devil comes and clamors for admission, he will find there is not a chair for him to sit on. Above all, you must endeavor daily to walk in a closer fellowship with Christ. It is always easier to have lovely thoughts when walking with the Altogether Lovely One.

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

Dist. Worldwide in the Great Freeware Bible Study package called
e-Sword by Rick Meyer: http://www.e-sword.net/downloads.html
Full Featured - Outstanding - Completely FREE - No Strings Attached

(The goal of Rick Meyer is to distribute excellent Bible Study
Software to every country on earth in their own language FREE
of charge, and that goal gets closer by the day.)
____________________

[nChrist]

November 10

The Virtue of Forbearance - Page 1
by George H. Morrison

Forbearing one another— Col_3:13

Three Necessary Virtues

If a man is to live with any joy and fullness and to find what a noble abode this world may prove, there are three virtues which he must steadily pursue. The first is faith in God, for without faith existence will always be a tangled skein; the second is courage, for every life has its hills and we face them poorly if our heart is faint; and the third is forbearance—forbearing one another. It is on forbearance then that I desire to dwell, and I propose to gather up what I wish to say in this way. First, I shall touch on some of the evils of the unforbearing spirit. Second, I shall indicate the character of true forbearance. Then I shall suggest some thoughts to make us more forbearing.

An Unforbearing Spirit Makes Life a Disappointment

First, then, some of the evils of the unforbearing spirit; and one of the first of them to arrest me is that it makes life a constant disappointment. I have often wondered that there is no trace of disappointment in the life of our Lord Jesus Christ. You may call Him a despised man if you will, but you could never call Him a disappointed man. He came to His own and His own received Him not; they laughed Him to scorn and then they crucified Him; yet when He entered the glory and saw His Father's face, do you think He said, "Father, it has been a tragic disappointment"? For all its sorrow, life was not that to Christ: it was full and fresh and dew-touched to the close, and one of the sources of that unfailing freshness was our Savior's knowledge of the secret of forbearance. Jesus expected great things from humanity. Jesus never expected the impossible. I like to think that He who made the heavens was ready when the hour came to make allowances. Depend upon it that if we expect the impossible, we are doomed to the disappointment which is worse than death. There is only one highway to the world's true comradeship—it is the road of forbearing one another.

It Hurts Those We Love the Most

Another evil of the unforbearing spirit is this, that it presses hardest on life's tenderest relationships. It becomes powerful for evil in that very region where ties are most delicate and life most sweet. There are some worms that are content to gnaw green leaves and to spend their lives on the branches of the tree. But there are others that are never satisfied with leaves, they must eat their way into the red heart of the rose. That is the curse of the unforbearing spirit—it gnaws at the very heart of the rose of life. It is comparatively easy to be forbearing with those whom we rarely meet and whom we hardly know. We are all tolerant of those who lightly touch us. But it is with those whom we meet and among whom we mingle dally, who share the same home with us, who live with us and love us—it is with those that it is often hardest to forbear, and it is on those that the sorrow of unforbearance falls. There are ministers who can speak well of every congregation except the one which they have been called to serve. There are husbands who are gentle to everybody's faults with the exception of the faults of their own wives. And it is just because unforbearance has a greater scope in proportion as life's ties grow tenderer and dearer, that the Gospel of love insists so urgently on the duty of forbearing one another.

It Reacts with Certainty upon the Man Himself

But there is another evil of the unforbearing temper—it reacts with certainty upon the man himself. For with what judgment we judge we shall be judged, and with what measure we mete it shall be measured unto us. If we are intolerant, we become intolerable. If we never make allowances for anybody, God knows the scant allowance that we get. Just think of the Pharisees a moment. Their crowning vice was that they were unforbearing. There was not a little that was good in many Pharisees, but they were harsh and censorious and exacting—need I remind you of the vials of stern judgment that were poured on the Pharisees by Jesus Christ? Let that suffice for the evils of unforbearance. It makes life one constant disappointment. It presses hardest on life's tenderest ties. It reacts inevitably on the man himself.

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[nChrist]

The Virtue of Forbearance - Page 2
by George H. Morrison

True Forbearance Begins in a Man's Thought

In the second place I wish to indicate the character of true forbearance, and it is urgently important that we should pay heed to this. For the devil has got his counterfeit of every grace, and a counterfeit grace is sometimes worse than sin.
The first thing that I would say about it is that tree forbearance begins in a man's thought. It is a good thing to be forbearing in our acts, a great thing to be so in our speech, yet I question if we have begun to practice rightly this preeminently Christian virtue till we are habitually forbearing in our thought. "Master," said the disciples, "shall we call down fire on these villages? They would not receive us: shall we clear them away like Sodom?" And it was not quite for their words that Christ rebuked them—ye know not what spirit ye are of. Ah! if our bitter and unforbearing words flashed into utterance without any thought, they would not wound so nor would they leave these scars that the kindnesses of weeks cannot efface. It is because they so often betray the unforbearing thoughts that have been harbored in secret and cherished in the dark that the bite of them is like a serpent's fang. We talk of a hasty word, but a hasty word might mean little if it were only the out-flash of a hasty thought. What a hasty word often implies is this: that in secret we have been putting the worst construction upon things; then comes the moment of temper when the tongue is loosened, and we never meant to utter what we thought, but it escapes us—-only a hasty word—yet the bitter thoughts of a fortnight may be in it. True forbearance begins in a man's thought.

It Is Independent of Our Moods

Again, true forbearance is independent of our moods. It does not vary with our varying temper. It is a mock forbearance that comes and goes with every variation in the day. There are times when it is very easy to be forbearing. When things have gone well with us, when we are feeling strong, or when some great happiness has touched our hearts—it is not difficult to be forbearing then. When we are in a good humor with ourselves, we can be in a good humor with everybody. But true forbearance is not a passing gleam nor is it the child of a happy mood or temper; it does not depend on the state of man's health or on whether or not he has had a good day at business. It is a virtue to be loyally practiced for Christ's sake whatever our mood or disappointment be. I should not have wondered much if Christ had been forbearing when He rode in triumph into Jerusalem. Amid the cries of Hosanna and the strewing of the palm branches it might have been easy to have congenial views. But when His face was marred more than any man's, when they were looking on Him whom they had pierced, when the nails were torture and when the cross was agony, was it not supremely hard to be forbearing then? Yet it was then that the Redeemer prayed, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Forbearance must not vanish when we suffer.

It Helps to Better Things

There is one other mark on which I would insist and it is this, that true forbearance helps to better things. It is like the sunshine which brings the summer nearer; it is part of that gentleness which makes men great. There is a certain lenient indulgence that is the very antipodes of this great virtue.

There is a soft and easy way of smiling at all sin that may send a man to the devil double-speed. Such leniency is the leniency of Antichrist. Christian forbearance never makes light of sin; it never oils the wheels of Satan's chariot; it can be stem, it whets its glittering sword; if a man is a scoundrel it can tell him so. But it never despairs, never passes final judgments, sees possibilities, touches the chord of brotherhood until a man feels that someone believes in him, and sometimes it is heaven to feel that. One day they dragged a poor woman before Christ, and the Jews would have stoned her, for she was taken in sin. But Jesus said "Neither do I condemn thee; go, and sin no more," and I am certain she never so sinned again. Peter was saved by the forbearance of Christ Jesus—"and the Lord turned, and looked upon Peter." Thomas was saved by the forbearance of Christ Jesus—"reach hither thine hand, thou doubter, let Me not scold thee." The forbearance of Christ was a great moral power, and all Christian forbearance must share the same prerogative.

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[nChrist]

The Virtue of Forbearance - Page 3
by George H. Morrison

Forbear Others because You Know So Little about Them

Then lastly let me suggest some thoughts that may help to make us more forbearing.

First think how little we know of one another. We know far too little to be censorious or harsh. One secret of the perfect gentleness of Christ is His perfect knowledge of everyone He met. I suppose that most of us have known some man whom for years, perhaps, we used to judge unkindly. We never liked him and our thoughts of him were bitter. Then one day we learned the story of his life, and we found that long ago when the heavens were blue above him, there had fallen on his life some crushing blow; and we say "Ah! if we had only known that story, we should never have judged the man as we have done." It is well to remember how ignorant we are when we are tempted to be unforbearing. There may have been something in the upbringing that would explain a score of things if we but knew it. There may have been elements that made the temptation awful, yet how we jested and sneered when someone fell! Forbearing one another—because of life's complexity; because we cannot see, because we do not know; because only God can tell the million threads that are woven into the tapestry of being. Our very dearest are such strangers to us that it is always wisest to forbear.

We Need Others to Forbear Us

Next think how greatly we ourselves need forbearance. Even if we do not give it, we all want it. I suppose we all irritate and alienate other people a thousand times more often than we ever dream of. If other people are doing so to us, it is but reasonable to think we are doing so to them. Never a sun sets but a man feels how easily he might have been misjudged that day. Never a morning breaks but a man knows that he will make demands on the forbearance of the world. If we need forbearance, then let us give forbearance. If we need to be kindly judged, then let us judge so. Let us forbear one another because of our own great need.

How God Is Forbearing Us

Lastly think how God has forborne us. The forbearance of God is a perpetual wonder. He has been willing that men should taunt Him with being idle, and He has been willing that men should say He did not care rather than that He should seem an unforbearing God. Is there no secret passage in your life which being trumpeted abroad would have almost ruined you? God in His mercy has never blown that trumpet blast, and His long-suffering has been your salvation. Then we are such poor scholars in His school; we are so backward and so soon turned aside; we make so little progress in His teaching and are so keen about everything save Him—surely there is no forbearance in the world like the forbearance of our heavenly Father. It is a great example: shall we not copy it? Days will be golden and silenced birds will sing when we revive the grace of forbearing one another.

____________________

George H. Morrison Devotions

Dist. Worldwide in the Great Freeware Bible Study package called
e-Sword by Rick Meyer: http://www.e-sword.net/downloads.html
Full Featured - Outstanding - Completely FREE - No Strings Attached

(The goal of Rick Meyer is to distribute excellent Bible Study
Software to every country on earth in their own language FREE
of charge, and that goal gets closer by the day.)
____________________

[nChrist]

November 11

The Perfecting Power of Love - Page 1
by George H. Morrison

Above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfectness— Col_3:14

Paul, an Apostle of Love

We are accustomed to think of Paul as a dogmatic writer, never so happy as when immersed in argument, but we must not forget with what affecting tenderness he has written of the grace of love. Great intellectual strength like that of Paul is often intolerant of tender feeling. Moving along the lines of demonstration, it disdains the heart as a true source of knowledge; but from that temptation Paul is entirely free for while he is the very prince of reasoners, he insists with ever increasing emphasis on the power and the primacy of love. It is not John, it is Paul who tells us that love is the fulfilling of the law. It is Paul who writes that wonderful hymn of love which we find in the thirteenth chapter of Corinthians. So here it is Paul who, after a noble passage describing our death and life in Jesus Christ, bids us put on the bond of charity.

Love Beautifies and Perfects Every Other Grace

Now a word or two will explain to us the figure which the apostle uses to convey his meaning: "Above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfectness." The picture in the apostle's mind is that of one who is putting on his raiment. He sees a man throwing around his body the loose and flowing garments of antiquity. And then it occurs to him that these loose garments, no matter how fine or beautiful they be, can never be worn with comfort or grace unless they are clasped together with a girdle. Without that girdle drawing all together, they hamper and hinder a man at every turn. It is the perfect bond of robe and tunic, the final touch that makes them serviceable. And so, says Paul, is it with love; it is the girdle of every other grace; it is the final touch that beautifies the whole and makes every garment of the spirit perfect. Under the figure, then, there lies one thought—it is the thought of the perfecting of love. Love is the girdle binding all together and giving to everything its proper beauty. On that, then, I want to dwell a little; on love, not in its inherent qualities but in its singular and incommunicable power of perfecting everything that clothes our being.

Love Is Needed for the Perfecting of Gifts

How true this is of spiritual gifts we learn from the first epistle to the Corinthians. That church at Corinth was very rich in gifts; so rich, that there was trouble over them. One had the gift of prophecy and one of prayer; one had the gift of tongues and one of healing; and every man in the ardor of the spirit was claiming for his own gift a proud preeminence until at last the danger grew so great and the scandal of bickering so soul-destroying that the Corinthian Christians wrote to Paul begging him for his advice and guidance. What was the counsel which the apostle gave? First, he said, covet earnestly the best gifts. Remember, he means, that though all gifts are of God, yet all are not equal in spiritual value. But then immediately he turns from that as though it were too hard for these Corinthians, and he says "and yet I show you a more excellent way"—and that more excellent way is love. It is thus that Paul introduces that great chapter in which he glorifies the powers of love. There will be no more trouble about spiritual gifts if love is the girdle which includes them all. Without love, the graces of the spirit will irritate like flowing garments in the gale. Love is the perfect bond which makes them serviceable, keeping each in its peculiar place.

Not only is this true of spiritual gifts; it is true of artistic and intellectual gifts. Over them all a man must put on love, for love is the final touch that perfects them. Take for example the happy gift of song which God has bestowed so freely on His children. We have all listened, I take it, to some singers who have set us wondering at their perfect art. Artistically there was not a flaw to find; there was consummate mastery and perfect execution, and yet the song somehow failed to move us or to strike a responsive chord within our breast. The gift was there—that no one would deny—and it had been trained with splendid perseverance, but there was one thing lacking to complete it and that was the perfecting impress of the heart. You can arrest and dazzle without love, but without love you cannot charm or win. You cannot open these ivory and golden gates that lead to the secret places of the soul. Hence a poor gift, if there be love behind it, will set the eye glistening with tears while the most brilliant gift, flit be loveless, will leave us wondering and leave us cold. I have heard preachers whose intellectual gifts were such that any man might covet them. Yet they never moved me to abhor the wrong or kindled me to joy in what was fair. But I have heard others whose gifts were not remarkable but who were on fire with love to God and man, and there was a power about their simplest word that made a man ashamed of his poor life. My brother and sister, whatever be your gift, over that gift put on the belt of love. Covet earnestly the best gifts, but covet love to beautify them all. Study is noble, and discipline is good, and perseverance is a heroic virtue; but in all the range of gifts there is not one that does not call for love to perfect it.

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[nChrist]

The Perfecting Power of Love - Page 2
by George H. Morrison

Love Perfects Service

If one were asked to explain what life is, it might be difficult to give an answer. Perhaps we get nearest to life's deepest meaning when we interpret it in terms of service. All life is service. We all must serve to live. Obedience is the first condition of all progress. Hence Christ, the consummation of humanity, was among men as one who serveth.

Service of Necessity

Now I think that when we look at service, we can distinguish three ascending stages in it. In the first place, and on the lowest stage, we discover the service of necessity. There are many things which we are forced to do and which we would never dream of doing were we free. They meet us in the performance of our work perhaps, and we would gladly shirk them if we could. But we cannot shirk them if we wish to live, they are part of the terms on which we have our being; they are the very condition of existence and not to render them would be suicide. Such service to which we are compelled is the poorest and the lowest form of service. True, it is dignified when it is bravely borne and carried through in an unmurmuring way. But the very fact that it is forced upon us and would be at once rejected were we free, invests it with a certain meanness and robs it of liberty and of delight.

Service of Duly

The next stage is the service of duty—all that we do because it is our duty. It is the service we render not because we must. It is the service we give because we ought. It, too, may be uncongenial service—not at all what we should have chosen for ourselves, and we may think it hard that we should have been summoned to bear such burdens or carry through such tasks. But conscience tells us it is the path for us, and so we pray to God to strengthen us and then, with whatever manhood we possess, we go quietly forward on the path of duty. There is always something noble in that service, yet it is hardly the highest kind of service. There is a lack of joy in it—a lack of music—there is not the gladsomeness as of a happy child. Something is wanting to make the service perfect, to make it a thing of beauty and a joy forever, and what it lacks to crown it with delight is the final touch of love. It is love that makes every service perfect. It is love that turns the task into delight. Love never asks how little can I do. Love always asks how much. And that is why in all the range of service there is no service like that inspired by love, whether the love of a mother for her children or that of Jesus Christ for all mankind.

I might illustrate this ascending scale of service by an imagined case from our old customs. Think, then, of some young man a hundred years ago drafted into the service of the navy. Caught by the draft and torn away from home, how intolerable that service must have seemed! For a time, it would be the bitterest of drudgery performed with many a muttering and curse. There was no escape—it had to be performed—the lash and the irons followed disobedience; that, in the harshest and extremist sense, was the service of necessity. But can we not imagine that young man rousing himself into a worthier mood? At the call of danger he would forget his bondage and think of the peril of his native land. And patriotic feelings would arise and his duty to his country would awake, and now his service would be a nobler thing because it was the service of his duty. But now suppose that a young man like that had sailed in the same vessel with Lord Nelson and had learned to love Nelson with that devoted love which filled the breast of every man who sailed with him. How different would his service now become! How gladly would he toil and fight and die! The thought of duty would be absorbed in love, and love would make his service perfect.

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[nChrist]

The Perfecting Power of Love - Page 3
by George H. Morrison

Love Perfects Relationships

Once more, I want you to observe that love is needed for the perfecting of relationships.

If you were to ask me what it is that makes life rich, I should answer that chiefly it is life's relationships. It is in the ties which link it to the lives of others that life enlarges to its greatest measure. Just think how poor your life would be today if the cords were cut which bind you to your friends. Son, father, sister, brother, friend and comrade—what would life be without such words as these? For no man liveth to himself—when he attempts it he is no longer living. It is in its wide and various relationships that life is ennobled and enriched.

Now when you come to think of it, you find there are three great enemies of a sweet relationship. The first is selfishness, the second pride, and the third destroyer of life's ties is fear. No man or woman who is selfish can ever know the joy of a deep relationship. If you are selfish you cannot be a friend. If you are selfish you cannot have a friend. For we never tell our secrets to the selfish nor open our hearts to them in confidence nor lean upon them with that confiding hope that calls for, and is always sure of, sympathy. Then in pride is a strange power of isolation. We say of the man who is proud that he is cold. No one is warmed by him in this chill world. No warmth of other lives dispels his iciness. The proud man is the solitary man and so always is the man who is afraid, whether it be the savage in the forest or the fearful sultan upon an Eastern throne. Where there is selfishness, then, or pride or fear, you never can have the fullness of relationship. Something is lacking in every human tie so long as these are mighty in the heart. And it takes a power that can conquer these and whose empire means the killing out of these if the relationships that make our lives are to come slowly to a perfect growth.

The Power That Conquers

It takes a power that can conquer these—you know as well as I do what that power is. Nothing but love, possessing all the heart, is able to dispossess these enemies. Love is the sworn enemy of selfishness, for it sets a crown upon the other. Love is the sworn enemy of pride, for love is ever warm and humble. And as for fear, there is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear, for fear hath torment. It is thus that love is imperatively needed for the perfecting of every human tie. Like a girdle you must clasp it on, if you would wear the garment of relationship. It and it only is the bond of perfectness between one life and every other life. Without it we may eat and drink and sleep. But with it in our daily life, we live.

Love Perfects Religion

So love is needed for the perfecting of gifts, for the perfecting of service and relationship. Now in closing and in a word or two, it is needed for the perfecting of religion.

It is a matter of infinite debate where precisely religion begins. Is it in fear of the darkness, in dread of the unknown; is it in some dim feeling of dependence? Brethren, we may have our own thoughts on that matter as a fascinating question of psychology, but wherever religion begins in the heart of man, it can never be perfect till it reaches love. If no relationship of earth is perfect till love has entered with its benediction, how can a man's relationship to God be perfect, if love is wanting there? For true religion is not a thing of doctrine nor of eager and intellectual speculation: it is the tie that binds the life on earth to the infinite and eternal life beyond the veil. I grant you that the distance is so vast there that you cannot gauge it by any earthly tie. I do not like that form of pious speech that is too familiar and has no place for awe. Yet the fact remains that every earthly tie is but a shadow of our tie with God, and if these cannot be perfect without love, no more, you may be sure of it, can that. Only when a man can lift his eyes and say with a cry of victory, "God loves me"; only when he believes though all be dark that the God who reigneth is a God of love; only then does his religion become a real, a very present help in time of trouble, a well of water in the burning desert, a cooling shadow in a weary land.

It is just that and nothing else which makes ours the perfect religion. For the perfecting of religion love is needed, and that love has been revealed in Christ. God commendeth His own love to us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish. When we have gazed upon the face of Christ, there are a thousand things we still may doubt; but there is one thing we can never doubt again, and that is the love of God. Love is the perfect bond between man and man. Love is the perfect bond between man and God. How shall we win it where everything is dark and a thousand divine providence's so baffling? Blessed Savior, we turn our hearts to Thee. We gaze upon Thy pierced hands and feet. He that hath seen Thee hath seen the Father. We rest at last upon the love of God.

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George H. Morrison Devotions

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