Gold Nugget 264 - Grains of Gold

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      Socrates used to go about Athens testing and refining men’s ideas, and in his own unrivalled method extracting the few grains of gold from the mass of rubbish in young men’s minds.  Our Lord did a more valuable service, testing men’s hearts rather than their heads, their characters rather than their opinions. 

      So severe was this testing process that Christ pronounced a special blessing on all who stood it.  Yet Christ’s teaching held out the door of mercy to all.  He showed to the world that in the midst of the dross of some of the foulest lives there were grains of gold, gems of Divinity, which his purifying power could disengage. … The purity of his life made his very presence like the flame of a refiner’s fire. … it was when he came home to men’s hearts and was manifested to their consciences that the real testing began.

The Pulpit Commentary, Malachi p.42-43, Malachi 3:2, (E. S. Prout)

See also:  Luke 7:23

Gold Nugget 264

Grains of Gold

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Gold Nugget 263 - Peculiar Affections

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      While a human father has the ordinary sensibilities of a man, he has the peculiar affections of a parent, a tender interest in his offspring, which he feels for no other object in the world.  So God is a Father.  Whilst he has an interest in all the works of his hands, he has a special interest in a human soul. …

      Filial love and loyalty raise and bind the souls of children to their parents.  Such is the feeling that human spirits should cherish and develop in relation to God.  Man is the only creature on this round earth that has the capacity, and consequently the obligation, to feel, entertain, or develop this filial affection.

      He then who is the Creator of all things in the world is the Father of man; all are his creatures, but men are his children.  Sublime distinction this!

The Pulpit Commentary, Malachi p.36, Malachi 2:10-12, (D. Thomas)

Gold Nugget 263

Peculiar Affections

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Gold Nugget 262 - Anchorage of Goodness

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      Daring men who are determined to “follow the devices and desires of their own hearts,” will bravely say, “Evil, be thou my good.”  But the process of deterioration is usually slower and more subtle.

      We want to do wrong, and we begin to wish that it were not wrong.  Then comes the doubt whether it is wrong.  Then we begin to imagine that it is wrong only under particular circumstances.  Then we find that our case does not come into the bad list.  And the way is open to do the wrong under the shadow of our self-delusion that it is really good.

      There are family delusions that lead us to call evil good; society delusions; sectarian delusions; and personal delusions.  These last are the most serious.  A man can easily persuade himself that the pleasant is the right; and he may only mean the pleasant to the body. …

      There is no hope for a man when he loses his sensitiveness to good, for with it goest his sensitiveness to God.  A man is never lost while he can believe in goodness.  There is anchorage in that. … Evil and good are contraries.  Hope for humanity lies in their never getting confused. 

The Pulpit Commentary, Malachi p. 33, Malachi 2:17, (R. Tuck)

Gold Nugget 262

Anchorage of Goodness

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Gold Nugget 261 - The Empty Mind

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      The more empty a man is, the more fluent he is.  The pauses in speech necessitated by thoughtfulness are never pleasing to the thoughtless; they are like the rattling flow.  The empty mind has generally a glib tongue.  Again, the more empty a man is the more dogmatic. 

      The thoughtful man can only suggest and hint, and cautiously and reverentially submit his doctrines.  For, as a thinker, he has touched difficulties and mysteries at every point; he can only speak with modesty.  This, to the people, is more or less distasteful; they want dogmatism, positiveness, assurance, amounting to audacity.  This the empty man can give.

      The more empty a man is, the more somnific.  The people do not like mental effort in their pews; what they want is gentle titillation and spiritual dreaminess.  This the empty man can and does supply.

The Pulpit Commentary, Micah p. 34, Micah 2:11, (D. Thomas)

Gold Nugget 261

The Empty Mind

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Gold Nugget 260 - The Prize of Life

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      What is that thing which is most worth having, most worth the thought of our minds, the strenuous striving of our soul, the labour of our hands?  Nations, communities, individual men, have given different replies.

      One has said ease, another wealth, another pleasure, another power, another glory.  The inspired Hebrew said peace.  The blessing he invoked on those he loved, and that which he lauded in speech and song, was peace.  And he was right.  Peace is the indispensable and the immeasurably precious thing. 

      It is a profound blessing.  It goes down to the depth of our compound nature; it is the excellent result of complete rightness – rightness of heart with God, rightness of life with man.  It is a lasting thing.  Other prizes may be snatched away by untoward circumstances, or their worth dims and lessens with the passing years, or even … with the fleeting days.  But this abides; prosperity does not injure it, adversity does not remove it, age does not diminish its excellency. …

      We can serve our race in higher and greater things without the other prizes of life, but not without this.  Not until our hearts have found rest in God’s truth and in himself can we be and say and do that which will guide the feet of our fellow-men into and along the paths of righteousness and wisdom.       

The Pulpit Commentary, Isaiah II p.323, Isaiah 55:13

Gold Nugget 260

The Prize of Life

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Gold Nugget 259 - A Father Still

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      The strongest ties we know of are in our human relationships; they are images of the Divine love.  Only an artificial theology has made the rectoral character of God override the paternal.

      Think you that on some wild Christmas, amid home’s most festive scenes, with the children and the children’s children about him, that father, whose hair is whiter than the winter snow, can forget the prodigal?  With the ruddy fire-glow around him, and the yule logs piled high, his mind wanders over the bleak and barren moorland of the outside world; and one faint knock at the portal, one weary step, one quivering lip, brings more music to his heart than the tabret and the dance.  He knows all about the squandered wealth, the profligate life, the reckless pilgrimage of vanity.  But his kindness cannot depart from him, for he is a father still. 

      I claim for God the very amplest application of that analogy. … God gave such tension and tenderness to the human heart to make our fatherhood a parable of his own!

      Life has been full of mercy to us all.  Homes have been revisited, friends have been restored, love has been consummated, new homes have been set up, accident has been averted, health has been restored, deliverance has been vouchsafed, affliction has been sanctified, and religious faith has in some cases been renewed and restored.

      Most wonderful of all is this.  We have lived through seasons in which subtle temptations have had their enchanter’s wand broken, and difficulties in our Christian faith have been removed.  True, indeed, it is that to some these words would mean nothing – would, perhaps, raise a smile of condescending pity for those of us who still believe in a God at all.  Some there are who wonder at the worship which rises above “the stream of tendency,” or the laws of evolution, to the Fountain of Life and Power which fills the universe with life and joy …

      Looking back, then, and taking a review of life preserved and life sustained, of friends given or restored, of love cemented and consecrated, of faith purified and elevated, must not our seal be set afresh to the truth of the words, “My kindness shall not depart from thee”?

The Pulpit Commentary, Isaiah II p.319-320, Isaiah 54:10, (W. M. Statham)

Gold Nugget 259

A Father Still

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Gold Nugget 258 - The Little Shoot

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      He grew up as a tender twig or as a sprout that struggles for life in a dry ground; he lacked the beauty that draws attention, the comeliness which wins regard in that:  He came of a fallen family.  He was a native of a despised and detested nation, probably the most hated and contemned of all nations.  He was brought up in a disreputable village, and the reproach of its dishonour fell on him.  He was untrained in the learning which is held in the highest regard among men.  He made no pretence to be a deliverer of the kind popularly desired; he dispensed with military arms, officers, honours; he made no attempt to effect a political revolution; he disregarded and even shunned mere popular favour.

      He taught truth which was above the appreciation and against the prejudices of his hearers; his thought was too profound for their understanding, his aims were too broad and liberal for their liking.  Hit truth still cuts across the prejudices, passions, and lowest interest of men; and his purpose is to establish a kingdom which is far too spiritual to meet the sympathies of the selfish and the worldly.

      Nevertheless, he accomplished his purpose.  That little shoot has become a strong tree, the strongest and fairest that has ever grown, the leaves of which are for the healing of all the nations.  That One in whom was no beauty that men should desire him is proving to be “altogether lovely.”

      What is there in him that draws the eyes and wins the hearts of men? … His patient dignity in moments of trial and provocation; his gentleness toward the young and the feeble; his interest in the unworthy and unbefriended; his magnanimity toward his enemies, his stainless purity of heart and life; his compassion for the suffering and the sorrowful …

      He offers forgiveness of sin to those burdened with a sense of guilt; rest of heart to those who are spiritually weary; holy and fruitful activity to the earnest and energetic; an unfailing friendship to the troubled and the lonely; a heavenly home to the tired travelers along the path of life.

The Pulpit Commentary, Isaiah II p. 304, Isaiah 53:2, (W. Clarkson)

Gold Nugget 258

The Little Shoot

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Gold Nugget 257 - Perfect Wisdom

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      Perhaps nothing shows more clearly the perfect “wisdom” of our Lord’s life upon earth than the fact that, among all his detractors, not one has been able to point out any unwisdom in any part of it.  Almost all men do unwise things, things which they regret to have done, things which do them harm, which injure instead of promoting the objects that they have in view.  But our Lord’s whole course was guided by the most perfect wisdom.

      Wisely he conformed in all respects to the Jewish Law, though he was above the Law.  Wisely he led, not the ascetic life, but the life of ordinary humanity.  Wisely he chose his disciples among those who were poor and ignorant and powerless, so that it might be evident they did not convert the nations by their natural gifts, but by wielding a supernatural influence.  Wisely he declined to be made an earthly king, so that ambition cannot be laid to his charge.  Wisely he submitted himself to the powers that be, that neither revolutionist nor anarchist might be able to make a shelter of his example.  Wisely he covered himself with a cloud, hid up his glory, did his great miracles comparatively in secret, let the knowledge of his true Divinity steal upon men by degrees.

      The wisdom wherewith he executed his mission is seen in the success of that mission.  How quickly did the “little flock” grow into a Church to be counted by thousands, and the thousands become tens of thousands, and the tens of thousands increase into millions, until the whole Roman empire was converted, and the “kingdoms of the world became the kingdoms of the Lord, and of his Christ”!  And what but infinite wisdom could have inspired a teaching which should attract both Jew and Gentile, both civilized man and barbarian, both haughty noble and down-trodden slave; which should, moreover, suit alike the requirements of both ancient and modern times, and be as much valued in the nineteenth century after its publication as in the first.

      By the wisdom – “science falsely so called” – of Greece and Rome “the world knew not God”; by the wisdom, the true wisdom, of Christ the whole civilized and much of the barbarian world now knows God.  The result is the effect that “prudent dealing,” or true wisdom in act and word, which Jesus Christ, the “Servant of Jehovah,” showed forth during the three and thirty of his life upon this earth.

 

The Pulpit Commentary, Isaiah II p. 282, Isaiah 52:13, (G. Rawlinson)

See also:  Isaiah 11:2, John 7:4, Acts 2:41, Acts 4:4, Revelations 6:15, I Timothy 6:20, I Corinthians 1:21

 

Gold Nugget 257

Perfect Wisdom

 

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Gold Nugget 256 - The Test of Value

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      Permanence is one of the principal notes of value.  The insect that hums through the air of one summer’s evening is comparatively worthless; the elephant that lives through a hundreds is valuable.  The wayside seed that lives its brief months is worthless; the giant oak that outlives the storms of generations is valuable.  And so our idea of extreme value, of absolutely priceless worth, is put into the figure of permanence – eternal, abiding, and continuing.

      The highest conceivable good is eternal life; the worst conceivable woe is eternal death.  This note of value tests things earthly; they are short-lived, and comparatively worthless.  It test things spiritual; they are long-lived, good, cannot die, and they alone are truly worth of the pursuit of those in whom God has breathed the breath of life.

The Pulpit Commentary, Isaiah II p. 275, Isaiah 51:6, (R. Tuck)

Gold Nugget 256

The Test of Value

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Gold Nugget 255 - Burdens Rightly Borne

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      The cursory reader of the ‘Pilgrim’s Progress’ will tell you that the pilgrim lost his burden from his shoulders when he gazed so trustfully upon the cross.  But the more careful reader, who notes Christian’s infirmities, and frailties, and stumblings, and falls, will tell you that the pilgrim bore his burdens right through to the end, and that they weighed him down even when crossing the stream.

      We have our burdens in our frail bodies – frail in the nerves, the head, the bones, the lungs, or yet more secret organs.  Each one has a real “thorn in the flesh,” which has influences far wider and more serious than he thinks.  We have our burdens in our dispositions and characters – burdens of despondency, or of impulsiveness, or of carnality, or of masterfulness, or of vanity, giving a bad appearance to all our work and relationship.  And the problem of our life is just this:  “How true, how beautiful can we become, with that burden, under the pressures and hindrances of that burden?”

      There is divinely arranged a great variety and wide distribution of burdens and disabilities, both in the sense of infirmities and calamities, so that we might come very near to one another, and really help one another.  As we meet and feel “I am a man with a burden,” we look into the face of our fellows, and he is a poor face-reader who does not say, “And my brother, too, is evidently a man with a burden.”  Perhaps a suspicion even crosses our mind that our brother’s burden is heavier than our own. 

      Burdens when rightly borne, never separate men from each other.  The sanctified bearing of our own makes us so simple, so gentle, so tender-hearted, that we can bear the burdens of others, in the spirit of our meekness and sympathy, and so fulfill the law of Christ. …

      Our great power is our power of sympathy.  We can come so near to our brother in his weakness, his disability, even in his sin, that he shall feel as if another shoulder were put under his burden, and it felt to him a little lighter.  We all yearn for sympathy; we all want some other human heart to feel in our trouble-times;

                                    “Oh what a joy on earth to find

                                      A mirror in an answering mind!”

      But we can often enter, as a relieving power, into the circumstances that make the burden.  The doctor takes the sufferer into his interest and care, and deals helpfully with the circumstances that make the burden.  And every one of us can be a doctor for the moral difficulties and distresses of life. 

      We have all more power over the circumstances that make trouble than we think … Beautiful in time of national calamity is the help which the poor give to the poor.  Beautiful ought to be the help which each gives to each, and all to all, in the ordinary burden-bearing of family and social life.

The Pulpit Commentary, Isaiah I p. 394, Isaiah 24:2, (R. Tuck)

Gold Nugget 255

Burdens Rightly Borne

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