We may a.s.sume that St. Paul means that the heathen man who in this life followed the dim light of his conscience is the man who will rejoice in the full light when it comes and that the man who has been wilfully shutting out that dim light of conscience here is thereby rendering himself less capable of accepting the fuller light when he meets it hereafter. In other words this life is his probation, he is forming on earth the moral bent of his future life.

We may a.s.sume the same of men in similar conditions in Christian lands, men brought up amid ignorance and crime, men brought up in infidel homes, men to whom Christ has been so unattractively presented that they saw no beauty in Him or even instinctively turned away from Him impelled by their conscience. They all have the light of G.o.d in some degree and by their att.i.tude towards the right that they know are determining on earth their att.i.tude towards G.o.d in the Hereafter. They are forming character and _character tends to permanence_.

The "outer darkness" it would seem comes not from absence of light but from blindness of sight. The joy of Heaven is impossible to the unholy just as the joy of beautiful scenery to the blind or the joy of exquisite music to the deaf. Probation in this life--simply means that in this first stage of his being a man either is or is not blinding his eyes and dulling his ears and hardening his heart so as to make himself incapable of higher things in the life to come.

If then it be possible even for a heathen to have in this life sufficient probation to determine his att.i.tude towards G.o.d for ever, how much more for a man in the full light of Christianity. In view of this the great law of life that CHARACTER TENDS TO PERMANENCE may it not be awfully true that a man who with full knowledge of Christ wilfully and deliberately turns from Him all through this life, should thus render himself incapable of turning to Him in any other life?

With _full knowledge of Christ_ I say, not with knowledge of some repulsive misrepresentation of Christ.

For think what it means to reject Christ wilfully with full knowledge of Him.

His voice still comes as we tramp on, With a sorrowful fall in its pleading tone: "Thou wilt tire in the dreary ways of sin; I left My home to bring thee in.

In its golden street are no weary feet, Its rest is pleasant, its songs are sweet."

And we shout back angrily hurrying on To a terrible home where rest is none: "We want not your city's golden street, Nor to hear its constant song!"

_And still Christ keeps on loving us, loving all along_.

Rejected still He pursues each one: "My child, what more could thy G.o.d have done?

Thy sin hid the light of heaven from Me, When alone in the darkness I died for thee.

Thy sin of to-day in its shadow lay Between My face and One turned away."

And we stop and turn for a moment's s.p.a.ce To fling back that love in the Saviour's face, To give His heart yet another grief, And glory in the wrong.

_And still Christ keeps on loving us, loving all along_.

Is it hard to believe that a man thus knowing Christ and wilfully rejecting Him should thereby risk the ruin of his soul? Can we not recognize this awful law of life that wilful sin against light tends to darkening of the light--that every rejection of G.o.d and good draws blood as it were on the spiritual retina, that a life of such rejections of the light tends to make one incapable of receiving the light for ever.

If this be so it is not at all fair to misrepresent it by saying that G.o.d cruelly stereotypes a man's soul at death and will refuse him permission to repent after death however much he may want to. The voice of the Holy Ghost within tells us that this could never be true of the Father. We must believe that through all Eternity, if the worst sinner felt touched by the love of G.o.d and wanted to turn to Him, that man would be saved. What we dread is that the man may not want to do so, may have rendered himself incapable of doing so. We dread not G.o.d's will, but the man's own will.

Character tends to permanence. Free will is a glorious but a dangerous prerogative. All experience leads towards the belief that a human will may so distort itself as to grow incapable of good. Even a character not hardened into permanent evil may grow incapable of the highest good. A soul even forgiven through the mercy of G.o.d may "enter into life halt and maimed" like a consumptive patient cured of his disease but going through life with only one lung.

Though the Bible does not give an absolutely definite p.r.o.nouncement on this question, yet the general trend of its teaching leads to the belief that this life is our probation time. It everywhere calls for immediate repentance. And St. Paul says that the Judgment is for deeds "done _in the body_," and there are such hints as "the door was shut"

and "there is a sin unto death," and "it were better for a man not to have known the way of righteousness than after he has known it to turn from it."[1] And this has been the general belief of the Church in all ages. Even in all the hopeful words of the ancient Fathers about Christ preaching to the spirits in prison who in the dark old world days "had sometime been disobedient," we have seen that they add some such significant phrase as "that He might convert those _who were capable_ of turning to Him." (See Chapter IV, p. 60.) And human experience of character tending to permanence makes this fact of human probation awfully probable. There is nothing in Scripture nor in its interpretation by the Church, nor in human experience, to conflict with the statement that in this life Acts make habits and Habits make Character and character makes Destiny.

What new discoveries of G.o.d's power and mercy may await us in eternity we cannot know, but from all we do know we are justified in thinking that (in the sense which I have stated) a man's life in this world determines his destiny--at any rate that a man who presumes recklessly on chances in the future is taking terrible risks. The Bible gives no encouragement to hope that one who with full knowledge of Christ keeps on wilfully rejecting Him all through this life will be able to turn to Him in any other life.

The only comfort we dare offer to anxious mourners grieving over sinful friends departed is that G.o.d only is the judge of what const.i.tutes irrevocable rejection of good, that we cannot tell who has irrevocably "done despite to the Spirit of grace," and that the deep love and pain of Christ for sinful men remains for ever and ever. We may tell the poor mother that her deep love and pain for her dead son is but a faint shadow of the deep love and pain of G.o.d--that no one will be surprised or trapped in his ignorance--that no one will be lost whom it is possible for G.o.d to save--that no one will be lost until "the Heavenly Father has as it were thrown His arms around him and looked him full in the face with the bright eyes of His love, and that of his own deliberate will he would not have Him" (Faber).

We dare not minimize what the love and pain of G.o.d may do, but we dare not presume in the face of Scripture to lighten the awful responsibility which this life brings.

Thus we reach larger thoughts of G.o.d's dealings with man and deeper interest in the infinite variety that must be in the "many mansions" of the boundless life hereafter. And this sets us wondering about another thought as to ministry in that life.

[1] I have not quoted such texts as "Where the tree falleth there it shall lie," which no sensible student now uses in this connection, nor even the well-known text, "Behold now is the acceptable time, behold now is the day of salvation," for the "acceptable time" and "the day of salvation" mean here not the present life of each man but the present Christian dispensation. St. Paul is quoting Isaiah's prophecy of Christ of the acceptable time and the day of salvation, and he says this time has come now in this Christian dispensation.

CHAPTER XI

MINISTRY IN THE UNSEEN LIFE

- 1

Is it allowable here to make a venture of faith and speculate on a matter of which we cannot give definite proof? There is a beautiful old allegory of KNOWLEDGE, the strong mailed knight, tramping over the great table-land that he surveyed, and testing and making his ground sure at every step, while beside him, just above the ground, moved the white-winged angel FAITH.

Side by side they moved, till the path broke short off on the verge of a vast precipice. Knowledge could go no further. There was no footing for the ponderous knight; but the white-winged angel rose majestically from the ground and moved across the chasm, where her companion could not follow.

Our path has broken off--knowledge can go no further. May we speculate with faith on something we cannot prove? I am thinking of a speculation very dear to myself, about that progress of our dear ones in the presence of Christ. Will not much of that progress in the life beyond come through unselfish ministry to others? Let us see what reason there is to hope it.

Think of all the true hearts who have lived on earth the Christ life of unselfish helpfulness. Can you imagine them never helping any one there, where growth in love is G.o.d's highest aim for them?

Think of our Lord's mysterious preaching in the Life after Death and remember that some of the best known teachers of the early Church believed that the apostles and others had followed His example. (See Chapter IV, p. 59.)

Think that there are countless millions in the World of the Departed born in heathen lands, born in Christian lands, who had no chance on earth of knowing Christ in a way to win their love for Him.

Think, how shall His command be fulfilled by His Church, "Go preach the good news to every creature"--EVERY creature. What a mockery it seems with the heathen dying half a million every week if no work for Christ goes on in the Unseen! If millions of those Hindoos who have died without the Gospel would have accepted it, do you think it is not being taught to any of them now? If the men of ancient Tyre and Sidon would have repented at the teaching and work of Christ, if the mighty works had been done in them, do you not think He has taken care since that the men of Tyre and Sidon should have their chance? If the heathen Socrates, and Plato, and Marcus Aurelius, and Epictetus would have fallen at His feet as their Master and Friend--and you know they would--do you think they have not learned to know Him by now? If honest hearts in our own land who have died repelled from Him through their ignorance and through stupid misrepresentations would have loved Him if they knew Him as He really is, do you think that no one is helping them to understand Him now? Can we doubt that somehow within the Veil they will learn more fully of His tender love? And judging from what we know of G.o.d's methods on earth, is it unreasonable to think that they will learn it from their brethren? True, G.o.d might help them by means of the angels. But in G.o.d's dealings with men's souls on earth not angels but men were the helpers He gave them. Even in the stupendous miracle of the conversion of St. Paul it was a man (Ananias) whom G.o.d sent to help him.

- 2

Here comes an interesting question about the doctrine of Election. To the generation before us it was a horrible doctrine clashing with all sense of fairness or right. Men said it meant that G.o.d decreed certain men to eternal Heaven and certain others to eternal h.e.l.l by His own arbitrary will. The stern revolt of Conscience at length sent us back to study our Bibles more carefully. We found that in the first recorded case of election Abraham was called _for the good of others_ "that in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed."

We saw reason to believe that Abraham's case was a type of all other elect--_elect for the service of others_. We found that the Bible consistently and throughout affirms that when "G.o.d calls or separates one man to Himself it is for the good of other men; that when He selects one family it is that all families should be blessed; that when He chooses one nation it is for the welfare of all nations; that when He elects and establishes a church it is for the spiritual benefit of the world. No man, no family, no nation, no church possesses any gift or privilege or superior capacity or power for its own use and welfare alone but for the general good." So we learned that G.o.d's word is true in spite of our stupid misunderstanding of it and that this doctrine of Election rightly understood is one of the n.o.blest things in the whole Bible.

Now comes my question. Are G.o.d's elect in the Hereafter life still "_elect for the service of others_"? Are those loving souls who are joyfully accepting Christ's service here,--destined for a still more glorious service in this ministry in the Unseen--the "first-fruits" of a great harvest which through them the Lord will reap in the Hereafter?

Will some be just saved, saved so as by fire, saved "by the skin of their teeth," as we say, missing the n.o.ble destiny of the "elect," the joy of being a blessing to their race?

- 3

"You have preached your last sermon," said one to Frederick Denison Maurice as he was dying. "Aye," he said; "but only my last sermon in THIS life." He believed he was going through the veil to preach to men. I believe it too, though I cannot prove it, nay, even though there be difficulties in the way of believing it. And many men greater than we are believing it, impelled by the stirring of Divine impulses within.

Do not think of it as merely a work for preachers and teachers. Every brave boy here who is trying to do right, every poor woman who is learning to love, every one who is blessing the world by kindly unselfishness, is helping on the Kingdom of G.o.d on earth and will be helping on the Kingdom of G.o.d beyond.

Surely there will be scope for them all. When you think of that great mingled crowd that is daily pa.s.sing through the gates of death, all sorts and conditions--from the strong saints of G.o.d to the poor children brought up in homes of sin--you need have little doubt that there is room for service.

If it be true, ah! think of it, you who are trying to forget yourselves, and live for others--think of the blessedness of your life in the waiting land. With the weak and the ignorant needing to be helped; with the little children needing to be mothered and loved; with the great heathen world, who have gone within the veil, never yet having heard of Christ.

- 4

If it be true, think how it takes away the reproach of "glorified selfishness," which many attribute to the Christians' glad hope.

Think how it helps in the perplexities about G.o.d's dealings when young and useful lives are taken from the earth. An angry mourner said to me recently, "I don't believe G.o.d has anything to do with it, else why should He take away a n.o.ble life like that and leave all these stupid useless people in the world?" I told him of my hope of this ministry in the Unseen and suggested that perhaps G.o.d did not want ONLY the stupid useless people.

And think especially how it deepens the importance of our life on earth to feel that it has a bearing on our usefulness for ever. The more we increase our talents here, the more we shall be able to help our Saviour there. He Himself suggests this in the parables of the Talents and the Pounds. "Thy pound has gained five, I will set thee over five cities. Thy pound has gained ten, I will set thee over ten cities. I will give thee a larger and n.o.bler work hereafter." Is not that an incentive to stir one's blood? The more I grow in love, in unselfishness, in knowledge of G.o.d, in righteousness of life, the more use I shall be to my dear Lord and to my brethren for ever.