 Chapter 11 of Practical Religion. This is a Lipidox recording. All Lipidox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit lipidox.org. Practical Religion by J. C. Ryle. Chapter 11 Formality. Having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof. 2 Timothy 3 verse 5. He is not a Jew which is one outwardly. Neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew which is one inwardly. And circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men but of God. Romans 2 verses 28 and 29. The texts which head this page deserve serious attention at any time, but they deserve a special notice in this age of the church and world. Never since the Lord Jesus Christ left the earth was there so much formality and false profession as there is at the present day. Now if ever we ought to examine ourselves and search our religion that we may know of what sort it is, let us try to find out whether our Christianity is a thing of form or a thing of heart. I know no better way of unfolding the subject than by turning to a plain passage of the word of God. Let us hear what St Paul says about it. He lays down the following great principles in his epistle to the Romans. He is not a Jew which is one outwardly. Neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew which is one inwardly. And circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, not in the letter, whose praise is not of men but of God. Romans 2 verses 28 and 29. Three most instructive lessons appear to me to stand out on the face of that passage. Let us see what they are. One, we learn firstly that formal religion is not religion, and a formal Christian is not a Christian in God's sight. Two, we learn secondly that the heart is the seat of true religion and that the true Christian is the Christian in heart. Three, we learn thirdly that true religion must never expect to be popular. It will not have the praise of man but of God. Let us thoroughly consider these great principles. Two hundred years have passed since a mighty Puritan divine said, Formality, Formality, Formality is the great sin of England at this day, under which the land groans. There is more light than there was but less life, more shadow but less substance, more profession but less sanctification. Thomas Hall on 2 Timothy 3 verse 5 in 1658. What would this good man have said if he had lived in our times? One, we learn first that formal religion is not religion and a formal Christian is not a Christian in God's sight. What do I mean when I speak of formal religion? This is a point that must be made clear. Thousands I suspect know nothing about it. Without a distinct understanding of this point my whole paper will be useless. My first step shall be to paint, describe and define. When a man is a Christian in name only and not in reality, in outward things only and not in his inward feelings, in profession only and not in practice, when his Christianity in short is a mere matter of form or fashion or custom without any influence on his heart or life. In such a case as this the man has what I call a formal religion. He possesses indeed the form or husk or skin of religion but he does not possess its substance or its power. Look for example at those thousands of people whose whole religion seems to consist in keeping religious ceremonies and ordinances. They attend regularly on public worship. They go regularly to the Lord's table but they never get any further. They know nothing of experimental Christianity. They are not familiar with the scriptures and take no delight in reading them. They do not separate themselves from the ways of the world. They draw no distinction between godliness and ungodliness in their friendships or matrimonial alliances. They care little or nothing about the distinctive doctrines of the Gospel. They appear utterly indifferent as to what they hear preached. You may be in their company for weeks and for anything you may hear or see on a weekday you might suppose there were infidels or daists. What can be said about these people? They are Christians undoubtedly by profession yet there is neither heart nor life in their Christianity. There is but one thing to be said about them. They are formal Christians. Their religion is a form. Look in another direction at those hundreds of people whose whole religion seems to consist in talk and high profession. They know the fury of the Gospel with their heads and profess to delight in evangelical doctrine. They can say much about the soundness of their own views and the darkness of all who disagree with them but they never get any further. When you examine their inner lives you find that they know nothing of practical godliness. They are neither truthful nor charitable nor humble nor honest nor kind tempered nor gentle nor unselfish nor honorable. What shall we say of these people? They are Christians no doubt in name yet there is neither substance nor food in their Christianity. There is but one thing to be said. They are formal Christians. Their religion is an empty form. Such is the formal religion against which I wish to raise a warning voice this day. Here is the rock on which myriads on every side are making miserable shipwreck of their souls. One of the wickedest things that Machiavelli ever said was this. Religion itself should not be cared for but only the appearance of it. The credit of it is a help. The reality in use is a cumber. Such notions are of the earth earthy. Nay rather they are from beneath they smell of the pit. Beware of them and stand upon your guard. If there is anything about which scripture speaks expressly it is the sin and uselessness of formality. Here what Saint Paul tells the Romans. He is not a Jew which is one outwardly. Neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh. Romans 2 28. These are strong words indeed. A man might be a son of Abraham according to the flesh. A member of one of the twelve tribes circumcised the eighth day. A keeper of all the feasts. A regular worshiper in the temple. And yet in God's sight not be a Jew. Just so a man may be a Christian by outward profession. A member of a Christian church that ties a Christian baptism and attendant on Christian ordinances. Yet in God's sight not a Christian at all. Here what the prophet Isaiah says. To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me saith the Lord. I am full of the burned offerings of rams and the fat of fed beasts and I delight not in the blood of bullocks or of lambs or of he goats. When you come to appear before me who have required this at your hand to tread my courts. Bring no more vain oblations. Incense is an abomination unto me. The new moons and sabbaths the calling of assemblies I cannot away with. It is iniquity even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hater. They are a trouble unto me. I am weary to bear them. And when you spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you. Yea, when you make many prayers I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Isaiah 1 verses 10 to 15. These words when duly weighed are very extraordinary. The sacrifices which are here declared to be useless were appointed by God himself. The feasts and ordinances which God says he hates have been prescribed by himself. God himself pronounces his own institutions to be useless when they are used formally and without heart in the worshipper. In fact they are worse than useless. They are even offensive and hurtful. Words cannot be imagined more distinct and unmistakable. They show that formal religion is worthless in God's sight. It is not worth calling religion at all. Here lastly what our Lord Jesus Christ says. We find him saying of the Jews of his day. These people draw of nigh unto me with their mouth and honour of me with their lips. But their heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship me. Matthew 15 verse 8. We see him repeatedly denouncing the formalism and hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees and warning his disciples against it. Eight times in one chapter. Matthew 23 verse 13. He says to them, We are unto you scribes and Pharisees hypocrites, for sinners of the worst description he always had a word of kindness, and had out to them an open door. But formalism he would have us know is a desperate disease and must be exposed to the severest language. To the eye of an ignorant man a formalist may seem to have a very decent quantity of religion. They are not perhaps of the best quality. In the eye of Christ however the case is very different. In his sight formality is no religion at all. What shall we say to these testimonies of Scripture? It would be easy to add to them. They do not stand alone. If words mean anything they are a clear warning to all who profess and call themselves Christians. They teach us plainly that as we dread sin and avoid sin so we ought to dread formality and avoid formality. Formalism may take our hand of a smile and look like a brother, while sin comes against us with sword drawn and strikes at us like an open enemy. But both of one end in view. Both want to ruin our souls, and after two formalism is far the most likely to do it. If we love life let us beware of formality in religion. Nothing is so common. It is one of the great family diseases of the whole race of mankind. It is born with us, grows with us, and is never completely cast out of us until we die. He meets us in church and it meets us in chapel. It meets us among rich and it meets us among poor. It meets us among learned people and it meets us among unlearned. It meets us among Romanists and it meets us among Protestants. It meets us among High Churchmen and it meets us among Low Churchmen. He meets us among evangelicals and it meets us among rich Elists. Go where we will, and join what church we may. We are never beyond the risk of its infection. We shall find it among Quakers and Plymouth Brethren as well as at Rome. The man who thinks that at any rate there is no form of religion in his own camp is a very blind and ignorant person. If you love life beware of formality. Nothing is so dangerous to a man's own soul. Familiarity with the form of religion while we neglect its new reality has a fearfully deadening effect on the conscience. It brings up by degrees a thick crust of insensibility of the whole inner man. None seem to become so desperately hard as those who are continually repeating holy words and handling holy things, where their hearts are running after sin and the world. Dandoards only go to church formally to set an example to their tenants. Masters who are family prayers formally to keep up a good appearance in their households. Unconverted clergymen who are every week reading prayers and lessons of scripture in which they feel no real interest. Unconverted clerks who are constantly reading responses and saying amen without feeling what they say. Unconverted singers who sing the most spiritual hymns every Sunday merely because they have good voices while their affections are entirely on things below. All, all, all are in awful danger. They are gradually hardening their hearts and searing the skin of their consciences. If you love your own soul beware of formality. Nothing finally is so foolish, senseless and unreasonable. Can a formal Christian really suppose that the mere outward Christianity he professes will comfort him in the day of sickness and the hour of death? The thing is impossible. A painted fire cannot warm and a painted banquet cannot satisfy hunger and a formal religion cannot bring peace to the soul. Can he suppose that God does not see the heartlessness and deadness of his Christianity? Though he may deceive neighbours, acquaintances, fellow worshippers and ministers with a form of godliness, does he think that he can deceive God? The very idea is absurd. He that form the eye shall he not see. He knows the very secrets of the heart. He will judge the secrets of men at the last day. He who said to each angel of the seven churches, I know thy works is not changed. He who said to the man without the wedding garment, Friend, how cameest thou in hither, will not be deceived by a little cloak of outward religion. If you would not be put to shame in the last day, once more I say, beware of formality. Psalm 114, verse 9, Romans 2, verse 16, Revelation 2, verse 2, Matthew 22, verse 11, 2. I pass on to the second thing which I propose to consider. The heart is the seat of true religion, and the true Christian is the Christian in heart. The heart is the real test of a man's character. It is not what he says or what he does by which the man may be always known. He may say and do things that are right from false and unworthy motives, while his heart is altogether wrong. The heart is the man. As he think of in his heart, so is he, verse 23, verse 7. The heart is the right test of a man's religion. It is not enough that a man holds a correct creed of doctrine and maintains a proper outward form of godliness. What is his heart? That is the grand question. This is what God looks at. Man looketh at the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh at the heart. 1 Samuel 16, verse 7. This is what St Paul lays down distinctly as the standard measure of the soul. He is a Jew which is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart. Romans 2, 28. Who can doubt that this mighty sentence is written for Christians as well as for Jews? He is a Christian, the apostle would have us know which is one inwardly, and baptism is that of the heart. The heart is the place where saving religion must begin. It is naturally irreligious and must be renewed by the Holy Ghost. A new heart will I give unto you. It is naturally hard and must be made tender and broken. I'll take away the heart of stone, and I'll give you a heart of flesh. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart, O God, that would not despise. It is naturally closed and shut against God and must be opened. The Lord opened the heart of Lydia. Ezekiel 36, 26. Psalm 2, 17. Acts 14, verse 14. The heart is the seat of true saving faith. With the heart, man believe of unto righteousness. Romans 10, verse 10. A man may believe that Jesus is the Christ as the devils do. Yet remain in his sins. He may believe that he is a sinner, and that Christ is the only Savior, and feel occasional lazy wishes that he was a better man. But no one ever lays hold on Christ, and receives pardon and peace, until he believes with the heart. It is heart faith that justifies. The heart is the spring of true holiness and steady continuance in well-doing. True Christians are holy because their hearts are interested. They are bathed in the heart. They do the will of God from the heart. Weak and feeble and imperfect as all their doings are. They please God because they are done from a loving heart. He who commended the widow's might more than all the offerings of the wealthy Jews regards quality far more than quantity. What he likes to see is a thing done from an honest and good heart. Luke 8, verse 15. There is no real holiness without a right heart. The things I am saying may sound strange. Perhaps they run counter to all the notions of some into whose hands his paper may fall. Perhaps you have thought that if a man's religion is correct outwardly, he must be one with whom God is well pleased. You are completely mistaken. You are rejecting the whole tenor of Bible teaching. Outward correctness without a right heart is neither more nor less than phariseism. The outward things of Christianity, baptism, the Lord's supper, church membership, almsgiving and the like will never take any man's soul to heaven unless his heart is right. There must be inward things as well as outward, and it is on the inward things that God's eyes are cheaply fixed. Here how St Paul teaches us about this matter in free most striking texts. In Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, the faith that worketh by love. In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing but the keeping of the commandments of God. 1 Corinthians 7, verse 19, Galatians 5, verse 6, Galatians 6, verse 15. Did the apostle only mean in these texts that circumcision was no longer needed under the Gospel? Was that all? No indeed. I believe he meant much more. He meant that true religion did not consist of forms, and that its essence was something far greater than being circumcised or not circumcised. He meant that under Christ Jesus everything depended on being born again, and having true saving faith, on being holy in life and conduct. He meant that these are the things we ought to look at chiefly and not at outward forms. Am I a new creature? Do I really believe on Christ? Am I a holy man? These are the grand questions that we must seek to answer. When the heart is wrong, all is wrong in God's sight. Many right things may be done. The forms and ordinances which God himself has appointed may seem to be honoured. But so long as the heart is at fault, God is not pleased, he will have man's heart or nothing. The ark was the most sacred thing in the Jewish tabernacle. On it was the mercy seat. Within it were the tables of the law written by God's own finger. The high priest alone was allowed to go into the place where it was kept, within the veil, and that only once every year. The presence of the ark with the camp was fought to bring a special blessing, and yet this very ark, due to its reliance, no more good than any common wooden box, when they trusted to it like an idol, with their hearts full of wickedness. They brought it into the camp on a special occasion, saying let us fetch the ark, that it may save us out of the hand of our enemies. 1 Samuel 4, verse 3. When it came in the camp they showed it all reverence and honour. They shouted for great shouts that the earth rang again, but it was all in vain. There were smitten before the Philistines, and the ark itself was taken. And why was this? It was because their religion was in mere form. They honoured the ark, but did not give the guard of the ark their hearts. There were some kings of Judah and Israel who did many things that were right in God's sight, yet were never written in the list of godly and righteous men. Where her burden began well, and for three years walked in the way of David and Solomon, 2 Chronicles 11, verse 17. But afterwards he did evil, because he prepared not his heart to seek the Lord. 2 Chronicles 12, verse 14. A biker according to the book Chronicles said many things that were right, and fought successfully against Jeroboam. Nevertheless the general verdict is against him. We read in Kings that his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God. 1 Kings 15, verse 3. Amaziah, we are explicitly told, did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, but not with a perfect heart. 2 Chronicles 25, verse 2. Jehu, king of Israel, was raised up by God's command to put down idolatry. He was a man of special zeal in doing God's work. But unhappily it is written of him. He took no heed to walk in the law of the Lord God of Israel with all his heart, for he departed not from the sins of Jeroboam which made Israel to sin. 2 Kings 10, verse 31. In short, one general remark applies to all these kings. There are all wrong inwardly. There are rotten at heart. There are places of worship in England at this very day, where all the outward things of religion are done to perfection. The building is beautiful. The service is beautiful. The singing is beautiful. The forms of devotion are beautiful. There is everything to gratify the senses. Eye and ear and natural sentimentality are all pleased. But all this time God is not pleased. One thing is lacking, and the want of that one thing spoils all. What is that one thing? It is heart. God sees under all this fair outward show, the form of religion put in the place of the substance. And when he sees that, he is displeased. He sees nothing with an eye of favour in the building, the service, the minister or the people. If he does not see converted, renewed, broken, penitent hearts, bowed heads, bended knees, loud our men's, crossed hands, faces turned to the east, all are nothing in God's sight, without right hearts. When the heart is right, God can look over many things that are defective. There may be faults in judgment and in thermities and practice. There may be many deviations from the best course and the outward things of religion. If the heart is sound in the main, God is not extreme to mark that which is amiss. He is merciful and gracious and will pardon much that is imperfect when he sees a true heart and a single eye. Jehoshaphat and Asa were kings of Judah, who were defective in many things. Jehoshaphat was a timid, irresolute man. He did not know how to say no, and joined affinity with Ahab, the wickedest king that ever reigned over Israel. Asa was an unstable man, who at one time trusted in the king of Syria more than in God, and at another time was rough with God's prophet for rebuking him. Two chronicles 16, verse 10. Yet both of them had one great redeeming point in their characters. For all their faults they had right hearts. The Passover kept by Hezekiah was one at which there were many irregularities. The proper forms were not observed by many. They ate the Passover otherwise than the commandment ordered, but they did it with true and honest hearts. And we read that Hezekiah prayed for them, saying, The good Lord pardon every one that prepareeth his heart to seek God. Though he be not cleansed according to the purification of the sanctuary. And the Lord hearkened to Hezekiah and healed the people. Two chronicles 30, verse 20. The Passover kept by Josiah must have been far smaller and worse attended than scores of Passover's in the days of David and Solomon, or even in the reign of Jehoshaphat and Hezekiah. How then can we account for the strong language used in scripture about it? There was no Passover like to that kept in Israel from the days of Samuel the prophet. Neither did all the kings of Israel keep such a Passover as Josiah kept, and the priests and the Levites and all Judah and Jerusalem that were present. Two chronicles 35, verse 18. There is but one explanation. There never was a Passover at which the hearts of the worshipers were so truly in the feast. The Lord does not look at the quantity of worshipers so much as the quality. The glory of Josiah's Passover was the state of people's hearts. There are many assemblies of Christian worshipers on earth at this very day, in which there is literally nothing to attract the natural man. They meet immeasurable dirty chapels so-called, or in wretched upper rooms and cellars. They sing unmusically. They hear feeble prayers and more feeble sermons. And yet the Holy Ghost is often in the midst of them. Sinners are often converted in them, and the kingdom of God prospers far more than in any Roman Catholic cathedral, or than in many gorgeous Protestant churches. How is this? How can it be explained? The cause is simply this, that in these humble assemblies heart religion is taught and held. Heart work is aimed at, heart work is honoured, and the consequence is that God is pleased and grants his blessing. I leave this part of my subject here. I ask men to weigh well the things that I have been saying. I believe that there are bare examination and all are true. Resolve this day whatever church you belong to, to be a Christian in heart, whether Episcopalian or Presbyterian, Baptist or Independent. Be not content with a mere form of Godliness without the power. Settle it down firmly in your mind that formal religion is not saving religion, and that heart religion is the only religion that leads to heaven. I only give one word of caution. Do not suppose, because formal religion will not save, the forms of religion are of no use at all. Beware of any such senseless extreme. The misuse of a thing is no argument against the right use of it. The blind idolatry of forms, which prevails in some quarters, is no reason why you should throw all forms aside. The Ark, when made an idol of by Israel and put in the place of God, was unable to save them from the Philistines. Yet the same Ark, when irreverently and profanely handled, brought death on Uzzah, or when honoured and reverenced brought a blessing on the house of Obededem. The words of Bishop Hall are strong but true. He that hath but a form is a hypocrite, but he that hath not a form is an atheist. Hall of Sermons number 28. Forms cannot save us, but they are not therefore to be despised. A lantern is not a man's home, yet it is a help to a man if he travels toward his home in a dark night. Use the forms of Christianity diligently, and you will find them a blessing. Only remember, in all your use of forms, the great principle that the first thing in religion is the state of the heart. 3. I come now to the last thing which I propose to consider. I said that true religion must never expect to be popular. It will not have the praise of man, but of God. I dare not turn away from this part of my subject, however painful it may be. Anxious as I am to commend heart religion to everyone who reads this paper, I will not try to conceal what heart religion entails. I will not gain a recruit for my master's army under false pretenses. I will not promise anything which the scripture does not warrant. The words of St Paul are clear and unmistakable. Heart religion is a religion whose praise is not of men, but of God. Romans 2, verse 29. God's truth and spiritual Christianity are never really popular. They never have been. They never will be as long as the world stands. No one can calmly consider what human nature is as described in the Bible, and reasonably expect anything else. As long as man is what man is, the majority of mankind will always like a religion of form far better than religion of heart. Former religion just suits an unenlightened conscience. Some religion a man will have. Atheism and downright infidelity of the general rule are never very popular. But a man must have a religion which does not require much. Trouble his heart much, interfere with his sins much. Formal Christianity satisfies him. It seems the very thing that he wants. Former religion gratifies the secret self-righteousness of man. We are all of us more or less Pharisees. We all naturally cling to the idea that the way to be saved is to do so many things and go through so many religious observances, and that at last we shall get to heaven. Formalism meets us here. It seems to show us a way by which we can make our own peace with God. Former religion pleases the natural indolence of man. It attaches an excessive importance to that which is the easiest part of Christianity, the shell and the form. Man likes this. He hates trouble in religion. He wants something which will not meddle with his conscience and inner life. Only leave conscience alone, and like herald he will do many things. Formalism seems to open a wider gate and a more easy way to heaven. Mark 6 verse 20 Facts speak louder than assertions. Facts are stubborn things. Look over the history of religion in every age of the world, and observe what has always been popular. Look at the history of Israel from the beginning of Exodus to the end of the Acts of the Apostles, and see what has always found favour. Formalism was one main sin against which the Old Testament prophets were continually protesting. Formalism was the great plague which had overspread the Jews when our Lord Jesus Christ came into the world. Look at the history of the Church of Christ after the days of the Apostles. How soon formalism ate out the life and vitality of the primitive Christians. Look at the Middle Ages as they are called. Formalism so completely covered the face of Christendom. The gospel lay as one dead. Look lastly at the history of Protestant Churches in these last centuries. How few are the places where religion is a living thing. How many other countries where Protestantism is nothing more than a form. There is no getting over these things. They speak with a voice of thunder. They all show that former religion is a popular thing. It has the praise of man. But why should we look at facts in history? Why should we not look at facts under our own eyes and by our own doors? Can anyone deny that a mere outward religion, a religion of downright formality, is the religion which is popular in England at the present day? It is not for nothing that St John says a certain false teachers. They are of the world, therefore speak they of the world, and the world hear of them. 1 John 4 verse 5. Only say your prayers and go to church with tolerable regularity, and receive the sacrament occasionally, and a vast majority of Englishmen will set you down as an excellent Christian. What more would you have they say? If this is not Christianity, what is? To acquire more of anyone is for bigotry, illiberality, fanaticism, and enthusiasm. To insinuate a doubt whether such a man as this will go to heaven is called the height of unchartfulness. When these things are so it is vain to deny that former religion is popular. It is popular. It always was popular. It always will be popular until Christ comes again. It always has had and always will have the praise of man. Turn now to the religion of the heart, and you will hear a very different report. As a general rule it has never had the good word of mankind. It has entailed on its professors laughter, mockery, ridicule, scorn, contempt, enmity, hatred, slander, persecution, imprisonment, and even death. Its lovers have been faithful and ardent, but they have always been few. It has never had comparatively the praise of man. Heart religion is too humbling to be popular. It leaves an actual man no room to boast. It tells him that he is a guilty, lost, hell-deserving sinner, and that he must flee to Christ for salvation. It tells him that he is dead and must be made alive again, and born of the spirit. The pride of man rebells against such tidings as these. He hates to be told that his case is so bad. Heart religion is too holy to be popular. It will not leave natural man alone. It interferes with his worldliness and his sins. It requires of him things that he loaves and abominates, conversion, faith, repentance, spiritual mindedness, Bible reading, prayer. It bids him give up many things that he loves and clings to, and cannot make up his mind to lay aside. It would be strange indeed if he liked it. It crosses his path as a killjoy, and a maplot, and it is absurd to expect that he will be pleased. Whilst heart religion popular in Old Testament times, we find David complaining. They that sit in the gates speak against me, and I was the song of the drunkards. Psalm 49 verse 12. We find the prophets persecuted and ill-treated because they preached against sin, and required men to give their hearts to God. Elijah, Micaiah, Jeremiah, Amos are all cases in point. The formalism and ceremonialism, the Jews never seem to have made objection. What they did dislike was serving God with their hearts. Whilst heart religion popular in New Testament times, the whole history of our Lord Jesus Christ's ministry and the lives of his apostles are a sufficient answer. The scribes and Pharisees would have willingly received a Messiah who encouraged formalism, and a gospel would exalted ceremonialism, but they could not tolerate a religion of which the first principles were humiliation, a sanctification of heart. Has heart religion ever been popular in the professing Church of Christ during the last 18 centuries? Never, hardly, except in the early centuries when the primitive church had not left her thirst love. Soon, very soon, the men who protested against formalism and sacramentalism were fiercely denounced as troublers of Israel. Long before the Reformation, things came to this pass that only one who cried apart holiness and cried down formality was treated as a common enemy. He was either silenced, excommunicated, imprisoned or put to death like John Huss. In the time of the Reformation itself, the work of Luther and his companions were carried on under an incessant storm of Calomy and Slander. And what was the cause? It was because they protested against formalism, ceremonialism, monkry and priestcraft and taught the necessity of heart religion. Has heart religion ever been popular in our own land in days gone by? Never, except in for a little season. It was not popular in the days of Queen Mary when Latimer and his brother Martyrs were burned. It was not popular in the days of the Stewards when to be a Puritan was worse for a man than to get drunk or swear. It was not popular in the middle of last century when Wesley and Whitfield were shut out of the established church. The cause of our martyred reformers of the early Puritans and of the Methodists were essentially one and the same. They were all hated because they preached the uselessness of formalism and the impossibility of salvation without repentance, faith, regeneration, spiritual mindedness and holiness of heart. Is heart religion popular in England at this very day? I answer sorrowfully that I do not believe it is. Look at the followers of it among the laity. They are always comparatively few in number. They stand alone in their respective congregations and parishes. They have to put up with many hard things, hard words, hard imputations, hard treatment, laughter, ridicule, slander and petty persecution. This is not popularity. Look at the teachers of heart religion in the pulpit. They are loved and liked no doubt by the few heroes who agree with them. They are sometimes admired for their talents and eloquence by the many who do not agree with them. They are even called popular preachers because of the crowd who listen to their preaching. But none know so well as the faithful teachers of heart religion. The few really like them. Few really help them. Few sympathize with them. Few stand by them in any time of need. They find like their divine master that they must work almost alone. I write these things with sorrow, but I believe they are true. Real heart religion at this day, no less than in days gone by, has not the praise of man. But after all it signifies little what man thinks and what man praises. He that judge of us is the Lord. Man will not judge us at the last day. Man will not sit on the great white throne, examine our religion and pronounce our eternal sentence. Those only whom God commends will be commended at the bar of Christ. Here lies the value and glory of heart religion. It may not have the praise of man, but it has the praise of God. God approves and honors heart religion in the life that now is. He looks down from heaven and reads the hearts of all the children of men. Wherever he sees heart repentance for sin, heart faith in Christ, heart holiness of life, heart love to his son, his law, his will and his word, wherever God sees these things, he is well pleased. He writes a book of revampants for that man, however poor and unlearned he may be. He gives his angel special charge over him. He maintains in him the work of grace and gives him daily supplies of peace, hope and strength. He regards him as a member of his own dear son, as one who has witnessed him for the truth, as his son did. Weak as the man's heart may seem to himself, it is a living sacrifice which God loves, and the heart which he has solemnly declared he will not despise. Such praise is worth more than the praise of man. God will proclaim his approval of heart religion before the assembled world at the last day. He will command his angels to gather together his saints from every part of the globe into one glorious company. He will raise the dead and change the living and place them at the right hand of his beloved son's throne. Then all that have served Christ with the heart shall hear him say, Come ye breast of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. You are faithful over few things, and I will make you rulers over many things. Enter into the joy of your Lord. You confess to me before men, and I will confess you before my Father and his holy angels. Ye are they who continued with me in my temptations, and I point unto you a kingdom, as my Father have appointed unto me. Matthew 25 verses 21 to 34, Luke 12 verse 8, 28 and verses 28 and 29. These words will be addressed to none, but who have given Christ their hearts. They will not be addressed to the formalist, the hypocrite, the wicked, and the ungodly. They will indeed stand by and see the fruits of heart religion, but they will not eat of them. We shall never know the full value of heart religion until the last day. Then and only then we shall fully understand how much better it is to have the praise of God than the praise of man. If you take up heart religion, I cannot promise you the praise of man. Pardon, peace, hope, guidance, comfort, consolation, grace according to your need, strength according to your day, joy which the world can either give nor take away. All this I can boldly promise to the man who comes to Christ and serves him with his heart, but I cannot promise him that his religion will be popular with man. I would rather warn him to expect mockery and ridicule, slander and unkindness, opposition and persecution. There is a cross belonging to heart religion and we must be content to carry it. For much tribulation we must enter the kingdom. All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. Acts 14 verse 22 2 Timothy 3 verse 12 If the world hates you God will love you. If the world forsakes you Christ has promised that he will never forsake and never fail. Whatever you may lose by heart religion be sure that the praise of God will make up for all. And now I close this paper with three plain words of application. I want it to strike and stick to the conscience of every one into whose hands it falls. May God make it a blessing to many a soul both in time and eternity. 1. In the first place is your religion a matter of form and not of heart. Answer this question honestly and as in the sight of God. If it is consider solemnly the immense danger in which you stand. You have got nothing to comfort your soul in the life of trial. Nothing to give you hope on your deathbed. Nothing to save you at the last day. A former religion never took any man to heaven. Like base metal it will not stand the fire. Continuing in your present state you are in imminent peril of being lost forever. I earnestly proceed you this day to know your danger. To open your eyes and repent. Church man or dissenter. High church or low church. If you have only a name to live and a form of God in us without the power. Awake and repent. Awake above all if you are an evangelical formalist. There is no devil said the quaint old Puritans like a white devil. There is no formalism so dangerous as evangelical formalism. I can only warn you I do so with all affection. God alone can apply the warning to your soul. O that you would see the folly as well as the danger of a heartless Christianity. It will sound advice which a dying man in Suffolk once gave to his son. Son he said whatever religion you have never be content with wearing a cloak. 2. In the second place if your heart condemns you and you wish to know what to do consider seriously the only course that you can safely take. Apply to the Lord Jesus Christ about delay and spread before him the state of your soul. Confess before him your formality in time past and ask him to forgive it. Seek from him the promised grace of the Holy Ghost and entreat him to quicken and renew your inward man. The Lord Jesus is appointed and commissioned to be a position of man's soul. There is no case too hard for him. There is no condition of soul that he cannot cure. There is no devil he cannot cast out. Seared and hardened as the heart of a formalist may be. There is balm and Gilead which can heal him and a physician who is mighty to save. Go and call on the Lord Jesus Christ this very day. Ask and it shall be given you. Seek and you shall find. Knock and it shall be open to you. Luke 11 verse 9. 3. In the last place if your heart condemns you not and you have real well-grounded confidence toward God consider seriously the many responsibilities of your position. 4. Praising daily who have called you out of darkness into light and made you to dither. 5. Praising daily and asking nether for sake the work of his own hands. 6. Watch over jealous watchfulness every part of your inward man. 7. Formality is ever ready to come in upon us like the Egyptian plague of frogs which went even into the king's chamber. 8. Watch and be on your guard. 9. Watch over your Bible reading, your praying, your temper and your tongue, your family life and your Sunday religion. 10. There is nothing so good and spiritual that we may not fall into formal habits about it. 11. There is none so spiritual but that he may have a heavy fall. 12. Watch their thought and be on your guard. Look forward finally in hope for the coming of the Lord. Your best things are yet to come. The second coming of Christ will soon be here. The time of temptation will soon be past and gone. The judgment and reward of the saints will soon make amends for all. Rest in the hope of that day. Work, watch and look forward. One thing at their any rate that day will make abundantly clear. It will show that there was never an hour in our lives which we gave our hearts too folly to Christ. 10. Come out from among them and be ye separate, sayeth the Lord. Second Corinthians 6.17. The text which heads this page touches a subject of vast importance in religion. That subject is the great duty of separation from the world. This is the point which Saint Paul had in view when he wrote to the Corinthians, come out, be separate. The subject is one which demands the best attention of all who profess and call themselves Christians. In every age of the church, separation from the world has always been one of the grand evidences of a work of grace in the heart. He that has been really born of the spirit and made a new creature in Christ Jesus has always endeavored to come out from the world and live a separate life. They who have only had the name of Christian without the reality have always refused to come out and be separate from the world. The subject perhaps was never more important than it is at the present day. There is a widely spread desire to make things pleasant in religion, to saw off the corners and edges of the cross, and to avoid as far as possible self-denial. On every side we hear professing Christians declaring loudly that we must not be narrow and exclusive and that there is no harm in many things which the holiest saints of old thought bad for their souls. That we may go anywhere and do anything and spend our time in anything and read anything and keep any company and plunge into anything and all the while may be very good Christians. This, this is the maxim of thousands. In a day like this I think it good to raise a warning voice and invite attention to the teaching of God's word. It is written in that word come out and be separate. There are four points which I shall try to show my readers in examining this mighty subject. 1. First I shall try to show that the world is a source of great danger to the soul. 2. Secondly I shall try to show what is not meant by separation from the world. 3. Thirdly I shall try to show in what real separation from the world consists. 4. Fourthly I shall try to show the secret of victory over the world. And now before I go a single step further let me warn every reader of this paper that he will never understand this subject unless he first understands what a true Christian is. If you are one of those unhappy people who think everybody is a Christian who goes to a place of worship no matter how he lives or what he believes, I fear you will care little about separation from the world. But if you read your Bible and are an earnest about your soul, you will know that there are two classes of Christians. Converted and unconverted. You will know that what the Jews were among the nations under the Old Testament, this the true Christian is meant to be under the new. You will understand what I mean when I say that true Christians are meant in like manner to be a peculiar people under the gospel and that there must be a difference between believers and unbelievers. To you therefore I make a special appeal this day while many avoid the subject of separation from the world and many positively hate it and many are puzzled by it, give me your attention while I try to show you the thing as it is. 1. First of all let me show that the world is a source of great danger to the soul. By the world, be it remembered, I do not mean the material world on the face of which we are living and moving. He that pretends to say that anything which God has created in the heavens above or the earth beneath is in itself harmful to man's soul says that which is unreasonable and absurd. On the contrary, the sun, moon and stars, the mountains, the valleys and the plains, the seas, lakes and rivers, the animal and vegetable creation, all are in themselves very good. Genesis 1.31. All are full of lessons of God's wisdom and power and all proclaim daily the hand that made us is divine. The idea that matter is in itself sinful and corrupt is a foolish heresy. When I speak of the world in this paper I mean those people who think only or chiefly of this world's things and neglect the world to come, the people who are always thinking more of earth than of heaven, more of time than of eternity, more of the body than of the soul, more of pleasing man than of pleasing God. It is of them and their ways, habits, customs, opinions, practices, tastes, aims, spirit and tone that I am speaking when I speak of the world. This is the world from which St. Paul tells us to come out and be separate. Now that the world in this sense is an enemy to the soul, the well-known church catechism teaches us at its very beginning. It tells us that there are three things which a baptized Christian is bound to renounce and give up and three enemies which he ought to fight with and resist. These three are the flesh, the devil and the world. All three are terrible foes and all three must be overcome if we would be saved. But whatever man pleas to think about the catechism, we shall do well to turn to the testimony of holy scripture. If the texts I am about to quote do not prove that the world is a source of danger to the soul, there is no meaning in words. A. Let us hear what St. Paul says. Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind. Romans 12, 2. We have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God. 1 Corinthians 2, 12. Christ gave himself for us that he might deliver us from this present evil world. Galatians 1, 4. In time past he walked according to the course of this world, Ephesians 2, 2. Demis hath forsaken me, having loved this present world. 2 Timothy 4, 10. B. Let us hear what St. James says. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the world. James 1, 27. Noeena that the friendship of the world is enmity with God, whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. James 4, 4. C. Let us hear what St. John says. Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man loved the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof. But he that doeth the will of God abideth forever. 1 John 2, 15 to 17. The world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. 1 John 3, 1. They are of the world, therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them. 1 John 4, 5. Whatsoever is born of God overcomeeth the world. 1 John 5, 4. We know that we are of God and the whole world lieth in wickedness. 1 John 5, 19. D. Let us hear lastly what the Lord Jesus Christ says. The cares of this world choke the word, and it becomeeth unfruitful. Matthew 13, 22. Year of this world, I am not of this world. John 8, 23. The spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive, because it seeeth him not, neither knoweth him. John 14, 17. If the world hate you, you know that it hated me before it hated you. John 15, 18. If you were of the world, the world would love his own. But because ye are not of the world, I have chosen you out of the world. Therefore the world hateeth you. John 15, 19. In the world, you shall have tribulation. But be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. John 16, 33. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. John 17, 16. I make no comment on these 21 texts. They speak for themselves. If anyone can read them carefully, and fail to see that the world is an enemy to the Christian soul, and that there is an utter opposition between the friendship of the world and the friendship of Christ, he is past the reach of argument, and it is waste of time to reason with him. To my eyes they contain a lesson as clear as the sun at noonday. I turn from scripture to matters of fact and experience. I appeal to any old Christian who keeps his eyes open, and knows what is going on in the churches. I ask him whether it be not true that nothing damages the cause of religion so much as the world. It is not open sin, or open unbelief, which robs Christ of his professing servants, so much as the love of the world, the fear of the world, the cares of the world, the business of the world, the money of the world, the pleasures of the world, and the desire to keep in with the world. This is the great rock on which thousands of young people are continually making shipwreck. They do not object to any article of the Christian faith. They do not deliberately choose evil and openly rebel against God. They hope somehow to get to heaven at last, and they think it proper to have some religion. But they cannot give up their idol. They must have the world. And so, after running well and bidding fair for heaven, while boys and girls, they turn aside when they become men and women, and go down the broad way which leads to destruction. They begin with Abraham and Moses, and end with Demis and Lot's wife. The last day alone will prove how many souls the world has slain. Hundreds will be found to have been trained in religious families, and to have known the gospel from their very childhood, and yet missed heaven. They left the harbor of home with bright prospects, and launched forth on the ocean of life with the father's blessing and a mother's prayers, and then got out of the right course through the seductions of the world, and ended their voyage in shallows and in misery. It is a sorrowful story to tell, but alas, it is only too common. I cannot wonder that Saint Paul says, come out and be separate. 2. Let me now try to show what does not constitute separation from the world. The point is one which requires clearing up. There are many mistakes made about it. You will sometimes see sincere and well-meaning Christians doing things which God never intended them to do in the matter of separation from the world, and honestly believing that they are in the path of duty. Their mistakes often do great harm. They give occasion to the wicked to ridicule all religion. And supply them with an excuse for having none. They cause the way of truth to be evil spoken of, and add to the offense of the cross. I think it a plain duty to make a few remarks on the subject. We must never forget that it is possible to be very much in earnest, and to think we are doing God's service, when in reality we are making some great mistake. There is such a thing as Zeal not according to knowledge. John 16.2 Romans 10.2 There are few things about which it is so important to pray for a right judgment and sanctified common sense as about separation from the world. A. When Saint Paul said come out and be separate, he did not mean that Christians ought to give up all worldly callings, trades, professions, and business. He did not forbid men to be soldiers, sailors, lawyers, doctors, merchants, bankers, shopkeepers, or tradesmen. There is not a word in the New Testament to justify such a line of conduct. Cornelius the Centurion, Luke the Physician, Zenas the Lawyer are examples to the contrary. Idleness is in itself a sin. A lawful calling is a remedy against temptation. If any man will not work, neither shall he eat. 2 Thessalonians 3.10 To give up any business of life, which is not necessarily sinful, to the wicked and the devil, from fear of getting harm from it, is lazy cowardly conduct. The right plan is to carry our religion into our business and not to give up business under the spacious pretense that it interferes with our religion. B. When Saint Paul said come out and be separate, he did not mean that Christians ought to decline all intercourse with unconverted people and refuse to go into their society. There is no warrant for such conduct in the New Testament. Our Lord and His disciples did not refuse to go to a marriage feast or to sit at meat at a Pharisee's table. Saint Paul does not say, if any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, you must not go, but only tells us how to behave if we do go. 1 Corinthians 10, 27 Moreover, it is a dangerous thing to begin judging people too closely and settling who are converted and who are not, and what society is godly and what ungodly. We are sure to make mistakes. Above all, such a course of life would cut us off from many opportunities of doing good. If we carry our master with us wherever we go, who can tell but we may save some and get no harm? 1 Corinthians 9, 22 C. When Saint Paul says come out and be separate, he did not mean that Christians ought to take no interest in anything on earth except religion. To neglect science, art, literature and politics, to read nothing which is not directly spiritual, to know nothing about what is going on among mankind and never to look at a newspaper, to care nothing about the government of one's country, and to be utterly indifferent as to the persons who guide its councils and make its laws, all this may seem very right and proper in the eyes of some people, but I take leave to think that it is an idle, selfish neglect of duty. Saint Paul knew the value of good government as one of the main helps to our living a quiet and peaceable life in godliness and honesty, 1 Timothy 2, 2. Saint Paul was not ashamed to read heathen writers and to quote their words in his speeches and writings. Saint Paul did not think it beneath him to show an acquaintance with the laws and customs and callings of the world and the illustrations he gave from them. Christians who plume themselves on their ignorance of secular things are precisely the Christians who bring religion into contempt. I knew the case of a blacksmith who would not come to hear his clergyman preach the gospel until he found out that he knew the properties of iron. Then he came. D. When Saint Paul said, Come out and be separate, he did not mean that Christians should be singular, eccentric and peculiar in their dress, manners, demeanor and voice. Anything which attracts notice in these matters is most objectionable and ought to be carefully avoided. To wear clothes of such a color or made in such a fashion that when you go into company every eye is fixed on you and you are the object of general observation is an enormous mistake. It gives occasion to the wicked to ridicule religion and looks self-righteous and affected. There is not the slightest proof that our Lord and his apostles and Priscilla and Persis and their companions did not dress and behave just like others in their own ranks of life. On the other hand, one of the many charges our Lord brings against the Pharisee was that of making broad their phylacteries and enlarging the borders of their garments so as to be seen of men. Matthew 23.5 True sanctity and sanctimoniousness are entirely different things. Those who try to show their unworldliness by wearing conspicuously ugly clothes or by speaking in a whining, snuffling voice or by affecting an unnatural slavishness, humility and gravity of manner miss their mark altogether and only give occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme. E. When St. Paul said, come out and be separate, he did not mean that Christians ought to retire from the company of mankind and shut themselves up in solitude. It is one of the crying errors of the Church of Rome to suppose that eminent holiness is to be attained by such practices. It is the unhappy delusion of the whole army of monks, nuns and hermits. Separation of this kind is not according to the mind of Christ. He says distinctly in his last prayer, I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil. John 17.15 There is not a word in the Acts or Epistles to recommend such a separation. True believers are always represented as mixing in the world, doing their duty in it, and glorifying God by patience, meekness, purity and courage in their several positions, and not by cowardly desertion of them. Moreover, it is foolish to suppose that we can keep the world and the devil out of our hearts by going into holes and corners. True religion and unworldliness are best seen, not intimately forsaking the post which God has allotted to us, but in manfully standing our ground and showing the power of grace to overcome evil. F. Last, but not least, when Saint Paul said, Come out and be separate, he did not mean that Christians ought to withdraw from every church in which there are unconverted members or to refuse to worship in company with any who are not believers or to keep away from the Lord's table if any ungodly people go up to it. This is a very common but a very grievous mistake. There is not a text in the New Testament to justify it. And it ought to be condemned as a pure invention of man. Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself deliberately allowed Judas Iscariot to be an apostle for three years and gave him the Lord's Supper. He has taught us in the parable of the wheat and tares that converted and unconverted will be together till the harvest and cannot be divided. Matthew 13.30 In his epistles to the seven churches and in all Saint Paul's epistles we often see faults and corruptions mentioned and reproved. But we are never told that they justified desertion of the assembly or neglect of ordinances. In short, we must not look for a perfect church, a perfect congregation, and a perfect company of communicants until the marriage supper of the Lamb. If others are unworthy churchmen or unworthy partakers of the Lord's Supper, the sin is theirs and not ours. We are not their judges. But to separate ourselves from church assemblies and deprive ourselves of Christian ordinances because others use them unworthily is to take up a foolish, unreasonable, and unscriptural position. It is not the mind of Christ and it certainly is not Saint Paul's idea of separation from the world. I commend these six points to the calm consideration of all who wish to understand the subject of separation from the world. About each and all of them far more might be said than I have space to say in this paper. About each and all of them I have seen so many mistakes made and so much misery and unhappiness caused by those mistakes that I want to put Christians on their guard. I want them not to take up positions hastily in the zeal of their first love which they will afterwards be obliged to give up. I leave this part of my subject with two pieces of advice which I offer especially to young Christians. I advise them for one thing if they really desire to come out from the world to remember that the shortest path is not always the path of duty to quarrel with all our unconverted relatives to cut all our old friends to withdraw entirely from mixed society to live an exclusive life to give up every act of courtesy and civility in order that we may devote ourselves to the direct work of Christ. All this may seem very right and may satisfy our consciences and save us trouble but I venture it out whether it is not often a selfish, lazy, self-pleasing line of conduct and whether the true cross and true line of duty may not be to deny ourselves and adopt a very different course of action. I advise them for another thing if they want to come out from the world to watch against a sour, morose, ungenial, gloomy, unpleasant, bearish demeanor and never to forget that there is such a thing as winning without the word. 1 Peter 3 1 Let them strive to show unconverted people that their principles, whatever may be thought of them, make them cheerful, amiable, good-tempered, unselfish, considerate for others and ready to take an interest in everything that is innocent and of good report. In short, let there be no needless separation between us and the world. In many things, as I shall soon show, we must be separate. But let us take care that it is separation of the right sort. If the world is offended by such separation, we cannot help it. But let us never give the world occasion to say that our separation is foolish, senseless, ridiculous, unreasonable, uncharitable, and unscriptural. End of Chapter 12, Part 1 Chapter 12, Part 2 of Practical Religion This is a Libydox recording. All Libydox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libydox.org Practical Religion by J. C. Royle Chapter 12, Part 2 The World In the third place, I shall try to show what true separation from the world really is. I take up this branch of my subject with a very deep sense of its difficulty, that there is a certain line of conduct which all true Christians ought to pursue with respect to the world and the things of the world is very evident. The texts already quoted make that plain. The key dissolution of that question lies in the word separation. But in what separation consists it is not easy to show. On some points it is not hard to lay down particular rules. On others it is impossible to do more than state general principles and leave everyone to apply them according to his position in life. This is what I shall now attempt to do. A. Thirst and Foremost He that desires to come out from the world and be separate, must steadily and habitually refuse to be guided by the world standard of right and wrong. The rule of the bulk of mankind is to go with the stream, to do as others, to follow the fashion, to keep in with the common opinion and to set your watch by the town clock. The true Christian will never be content with such a rule as that. He will simply ask what saith the scripture. What is written in the word of God. He will maintain firmly that nothing can be right which God says is wrong. And that the customs and opinions of his neighbours can never make that to be a trifle which God calls serious or that to be no sin which God calls sin. He will never think lightly of such sins as drinking, swearing, gambling, lying, cheating, swindling, or breach of the seventh commandment because they are common and many say where is the mighty harm. That miserable argument everybody thinks so, everybody says so, everybody does it, everybody will be there, goes for nothing with him. Is it condemned or approved by the bible? That is his only question. If he stands alone in the parish or town or congregation he will not go against the bible. If he has to come out from the crowd and take a position by himself he will not flinch from it rather than disobey the bible. This is genuine scriptural separation. B. He that desires to come out from the world and be separate must be very careful how he spends his leisure time. This is a point which at first sight appears of little importance but the longer I live the more I am persuaded that it deserves the most serious attention. Honourable occupation and lawful business are a great safeguard to the soul and the time that is spent upon them is comparatively the time of the least danger. The devil finds it hard to get a hearing from a busy man but when the day's work is over and the time of leisure arrives then comes the hour of temptation. I do not hesitate to warn every man who wants to live a Christian life to be very careful how he spends his evenings. Evening is the time when we are naturally disposed to unbend after the labours of the day and evening is the time when the Christian is too often tempted to lay aside his armour and consequently brings trouble on his soul. Then come of the devil and with the devil the world. Evening is the time when the poor man is tempted to go to the public house and fall into sin. Evening is the time when the tradesman too often goes to the impala and sits for hours hearing and seeing things which do him no good. Evening is the time which the higher classes choose for dancing, card playing and the like. Consequently never get to bed till late at night. If we love our souls and would not become worldly let us mind how we spend our evenings. Tell me how a man spends his evenings and I can generally tell what his character is. The true Christian would do well to make it a settled rule never to waste his evenings. Whatever others may do let him resolve always to make time for quiet, calm, thought, for Bible reading and prayer. The rule of proof the hard one to keep it may bring on him the charge of being unsocial and over strict. Let him not mind this. Anything of this kind is better than habitual late hours in company. Horrid prayers, slovenly Bible reading and a bad conscience. Even if he stands alone in his parish or town let him not depart from his rule. He will find himself in a minority and be fought a peculiar man but this is genuine scriptural separation. See, he that desires to come out from the world and be separate must steadily and habitually determine not to be swallowed up and absorbed in the business of the world. A true Christian will strive to do his duty in whatever station or position he finds himself and do it well. Whether statesman or merchant or banker or lawyer or doctor or tradesman or farmer he will try to do his work so that no one can find occasion for fault in him but he will not allow it to get between him and Christ. If he finds his business beginning to eat up his Sundays, his Bible reading, his private prayer and to bring clouds between him and heaven he will say, Stand back, there is a limit. Hitherto thou mayest go but no further. I cannot sell my soul for place, fame or gold. Like Daniel he will make time for his communion with God whatever the cost may be. Like Havlock he will deny himself anything rather than lose his Bible reading and his prayers. In all this he will find he stands almost alone. Many will laugh at him and tell him they get on well enough without being too strict in particular. He will heed it not. He will resolutely hold the world at arm's length whatever present loss or sacrifice it may seem to entail. He will choose rather to be less rich and prosperous in this world than not to prosper about his soul. To stand alone in this way to run counter to the ways of others requires immense self-denial but this is genuine scriptural separation. D. He that desires to come out from the world and be separate must steadily abstain from all amusements and recreations which are inseparably connected with sin. This is a hard subject to handle and I approach it with pain but I do not think I should be faithful to Christ and faithful to my office as a minister if I did not speak very plainly about it in considering such a matter a separation from the world. Let me then say honestly that I cannot understand how anyone who makes any pretence to real, vital religion can allow himself to attend races and theatres. Conscience no doubt is a strange thing and every man must judge for himself and use his liberty. One man sees no harming things which another regards with apporance as evil. I could only give my own opinion for what it is worth and it treats my readers to consider seriously what I say. Thought to look at horses running at full speed isn't itself perfectly harmless no sensible man will pretend to deny. That many plays such as Shakespeare's are among the finest productions of the human intellect is equally undeniable. But all this is beside the question the question is whether horse racing and theatres as they are now conducted in England are not inseparably bound up with things that are downright wicked. I assert without hesitation that they are so bound up. I assert that the breach of God's commandments so invariably accompanies the race and the play that you cannot go to the amusement without helping sin. I entreat all professing Christians to remember this and to take heed what they do. I warn them plainly that they have no right to shut their eyes to facts which every intelligent person knows for the mere pleasure of seeing a horse race or listening to good actors or actresses. I warned them they must not talk a separation from the world if they can lend their sanction to amusements which are invariably connected with gambling, betting, drunkenness and fornication. These are the things which God will judge. The end of these things is death. Hebrews 13 4 Romans 6 21 Hard words these no doubt but are they not true? It may seem to your relatives and friends very straight laced strict and narrow. If you tell them you cannot go to the races or the theatre with them but we must fall back on first principles. Is the world a danger to the soul or is it not? Are we to come out from the world or are we not? These are questions which can only be answered in one way. If we love our souls we must have nothing to do with amusements which are bound up with sin. Nothing short of this can be called genuine scriptural separation from the world. E. He that desires to come out from the world and be separate must be moderate in the use of lawful and innocent recreations. No sensible Christian would ever think condemning all recreations. In a world of wear and tear like that we live in occasional unbending and relaxation are good for all. Body and mind alike requires seasons of lighter occupation opportunities of letting off high spirits and especially when they are young. Exercise itself is a positive necessity for the preservation of mental and bodily health. I see no harm in cricket, rowing, running and other manly athletic recreations. I see no fault with those who play at chess and such like games of skill. We are all fearfully and wonderfully made. No wonder the poet says strange that the harp of thousand strings should keep in tune so long. Anything which strengthens nerves and brain and digestion and lungs and muscles and makes us more fit to Christ's work so long as it is not in itself sinful is a blessing and ought to be thankfully used. Anything which will occasionally divert our thoughts from their usual grinding channel in a healthy manner is a good and not an evil. But it is the excess of these innocent things which a true Christian must watch against if he wants to be separate from the world. He must not devote his whole heart and soul and mind and strength and time to them as many do if he wishes to serve Christ. There are hundreds of lawful things which are good in moderation but bad when taken in excess helpful medicines in small quantities downright poison when swallowed down in huge doses. In nothing is this so true as it is in the matter of recreations. The use of them is one thing and the abuse of them is another. The Christian who uses them must know when to stop and how to say hold enough. Do they interfere with his private religion? Do they take up too much of his thoughts and attention? Have they a secularizing effect on his soul? Have they a tendency to pull him down to earth? Then let him hold hard and take care. All this will require courage, self-denial and firmness. It is a line of conduct which will often bring on us the ridicule and contempt of those who know not what moderation is and who spend their lives in making trifles serious things and serious things trifles. But if we mean to come out from the world we must not mind this. We must be temperate even in lawful things whatever others may think of us. This is genuine scriptural separation. F. Last but not least. He that desires to come out from the world and be separate must be careful how he allows himself in friendships, intimacies and close relationships with worldly people. We cannot help meeting many unconverted people as long as we live. We cannot avoid having intercourse with them and doing business with them unless we go out of the world. 1 Corinthians 5-10 Treat them with the utmost courtesy, kindness and charity whenever we do meet them is a positive duty. But acquaintance is one thing and intimate friendship is quite another. To seek their society without cause, to choose their company, to cultivate intimacy with them is very dangerous to the soul. Human nature is so constituted that we cannot be much with other people without effect on our own character. The old proverb would never fail to prove true. Tell me with whom a man chooses to live and I will tell you what he is. The scripture says expressly, He that walketh with wise men shall be wise, But a companion of fools shall be destroyed. Proverbs 13-20 If then a Christian who desires to live consistently chooses for his friends those who either do not care for their souls or the Bible or God or Christ or holiness or regard them as of secondary importance it seems to me impossible for him to prosper in his religion. He will soon find that their ways are not his ways nor their thoughts his thoughts nor their tastes his tastes. And that unless they change he must give up intimacy with them. In short there must be separation. Of course such separation will be painful but if we have to choose between the loss of a friend and the injury of our souls there ought to be no doubt in our minds. If friends will not walk in the narrow way with us we must not walk in the broad way to please them. But let us distinctly understand that to attempt to keep up close in to perceive between a converted and an unconverted person if both are consistent with their natures is to attempt an impossibility. The principle here laid down ought to be carefully remembered by all unmarried Christians in the choice of a husband or wife. I fear it is too often entirely forgotten. Too many seem to think of everything except religion in choosing a partner for life or to suppose that it will come somehow as a matter of course. Yet when a praying, Bible reading, God fearing, Christ loving, Sabbath keeping Christian marries a person who takes no interest whatever in serious religion. What could the result be but injury to the Christian? Rements unhappiness. Health is not infectious but disease is. As a general rule in such cases the good go down to the level of the bad and the bad do not come up to the level of the good. The subject is a delicate one and I do not care to dwell upon it but this I say confidently to every unmarried Christian man or woman. If you love your soul if you do not want to fall away and backslide. If you do not want to destroy your own peace and comfort for life resolve never to marry any person who is not a fellow Christian whatever the resolution may cost you. You had better die than marry an unbeliever. Stand to this resolution and let no one ever persuade you out of it. Depart from this resolution and you will find it almost impossible to come out and be separate. You will find that you have tied a millstone around your own neck in running the race toward heaven and is saved at last it will be so as by fire 1 Corinthians 3 15 I offer these six general hints to all who wish to follow Saint Paul's advice and to come out from the world and be separate in giving them. I lay no claim to infallibility but I believe they deserve consideration and attention. I do not forget that the subject is full of difficulties and the scores of doubtful cases are continually arising in a Christian's course in which it is very hard to say what is the path of duty and how to behave. Perhaps the following bits of advice may be found useful. In all doubtful cases we should first pray for wisdom and sound judgment. If prayer is worth anything it must be especially valuable when we decide to do right but do not see our way. In all doubtful cases let us often try ourselves by recollecting the eye of God. Should I go to such and such a place or do such and such a thing if I really thought God was looking at me? In all doubtful cases let us never forget the second advent of Christ and the day of judgment. Should I like to be found in such and such company or employed in such and such ways? Finally in all doubtful cases let us find out what the conduct of the holiest and best Christians has been under similar circumstances. If we do not clearly see our own way we need not be ashamed to follow good examples. I throw out these suggestions with the use of all who are in difficulties about disputable points in the matter of separation from the world. I cannot help thinking that they may help to untie many knots and solve many problems. Four I shall now conclude the whole subject by trying to show the secrets of real victory over the world. To come out from the world of course is not an easy thing. It cannot be easy so long as human nature is what it is, and a busy devil is always near us. It requires a constant struggle and exertion. It entails incessant conflict and self-denial. It often places us in exact opposition to members of our own families, to relations and neighbours. It sometimes obliges us to do things which give great offence, and to bring on us ridicule and petty persecution. It is precisely this which makes many hang back and shrink from decided religion. They know they are not right. They know that they are not so foreign in Christ's service as they ought to be, and they feel uncomfortable and ill at ease. But the fear of man keeps them back, and so they linger on through life with aching, dissatisfied hearts, which too much religion to be happy in the world, and too much of the world to be happy in their religion. I fear this is a very common case if the truth were known. Yet there are some in every age who seem to get the victory over the world. They come out decidedly from its ways and are mistakenly separate. They are independent of its opinions and unshaken by its opposition. They move on like planets in an orbit of their own, and seem to rise equally above the world's smiles and frowns. And what are the secrets of their victory? I'll set them down. A. The first secret of victory over the world is of right heart. By that I mean a heart renewed, changed, and sanctified by the Holy Ghost. A heart in which Christ dwells. A heart in which old things have passed away, and all things become new. The grand mark of such a heart is the bias of its tastes and affections. The owner of such a heart no longer likes the world, and the things of the world, and therefore finds it no trial or sacrifice to give them up. He has no longer any appetite for the company, the conversation, the amusements, the occupations, the books which he once loved, and to come out from them seems natural to him. Great indeed is the expulsive power of a new principle. Just as the new spring buds in a beech hedge push off the old leaves and make them quietly fall to the ground, so does the new heart of a believer invariably affect his tastes and likings, and make him drop many things which he once loved and lived in, because he now likes them no more. Let him that wants to come out from the world and be separate, make sure first and foremost that he has got a new heart. If the heart is really right, everything else will be right in time. If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. Matthew 6, 22. If the affections are not right, there never will be right action. B. The second secret of victory over the world is a lively, practical faith in unseen things. What sayeth the scripture? This is the victory that overcomes the world and even our faith. 1 John 5, 4. To attain and keep up the habit of looking steadily at invisible things, as if they were visible. The set before our minds every day as grand realities. Our souls, God, Christ, Heaven, Hell, Judgement, Eternity. To cherish and abide in conviction that what we do not see is just as real as what we do see, and ten thousand times more important. This. This is one way to be conquerors over the world. This was the faith which made the noble army of saints, described in the 11th chapter of Hebrews, obtain such a glorious testimony from the Holy Ghost. They all acted under a firm persuasion that they had a real God, a real Savior, and a real home in Heaven, though unseen by mortal eyes. Armed with this faith, a man regards this world as a shadow, compared to the world to come, and cares little for its praise or blame, its enmity or its rewards. Let him that wants to come out from the world and be separate, but shrinks and hangs back for fear the things seen, pray and strive to have this faith. All things are possible to him that believes. Mark 9, 23. Like Moses, he will find it possible to forsake Egypt, seeing him that is invisible. Like Moses, he will not care what he loses, and who is displeased, because he sees a far off, like one looking through a telescope, a substantial recompense of reward. Hebrews 11, 26. See, the third and last secret of victory over the world is to attain and cultivate the habit of boldly confessing Christ on all proper occasions. In saying this I would not be mistaken. I want no one to blur Trumpet before him, and frustrate his religion on others at all seasons. But I do wish to encourage all who strive to come out from the world to show their colours, and to act and speak out like men who are not ashamed to serve Christ. A steady, quiet assertion of our own principles as Christians, and habitual readiness to let the children of the world see that we are guided by other rules than they are, and do not mean to swerve on them. A calm, firm, courteous maintenance of our own standard of things in every company. All this was sensibly form a habit within us. And make it comparatively easy to be a separate man. It will be hard at first, no doubt, and cost us many a struggle. But the longer we go on, the easier it will be. Repeated acts of confessing Christ will produce habits. Habits once formed will produce a settled character. Our characters once known, we shall be saved much trouble. Men will know what to expect from us. We will count it no strange thing if they see us living the lives of separate, peculiar people. He that grasps the nettle most firmly will always be less hurt than the man who touches it with a trembling hand. It is a great thing to be able to say no, decidedly, but courteously, when asked to do anything which conscience says is wrong. He that shows his colours boldly from the first, and is never ashamed to let men see whose he is, and whom he serves, will soon find that he has overcome the world, and will be let alone. Bold confession is a long step towards victory. It only remains for me now to conclude the whole subject with a few short words of application. The danger of the world running the soul, the nature of true separation from the world, the secrets of victory of the world are all before the readers of this paper. I now ask him to give me his attention for the last time, while I try to say something directly for his personal benefit. 1. My first word shall be a question. Are you overcoming the world, or are you overcome by it? Do you know what it is to come out from the world and be separate, or are you yet entangled by it, and conformed to it? If you have any desire to be saved, I entreat you to answer this question. If you know nothing of separation, I warn you affectionately that your soul is in great danger. The world passeth away, and they who cling to the world and think only of the world will pass away with it to everlasting ruin. Awake to know your peril before it is too late. Awake and flee from the rough to come. The time is short, the end of all things is at hand. The shadows are lengthening. The sun is going down. The night cometh when no man can work. The great white throne will soon be set. The judgment will begin. The books will be opened. Awake and come out from the world while it is called today. Yet a little while, and there will be no more worldly occupations and worldly amusements. No more getting money and spending money. No more eating and drinking and feasting and dressing, and ball going, and theatres and races and cards and gambling. What will you do when all these things have passed away forever? How can you possibly be happy in an eternal heaven where holiness is all in all, and worldliness has no place? Oh consider these things and be wise. Awake and break the chains which the world has thrown around you. Awake and flee from the rough to come. Two. My second word shall be a counsel. If you want to come out from the world but know not what to do, take the advice which I give you this day. Begin by applying direct as a penitent sinner to our Lord Jesus Christ, and put your case in his hands. Pour out your heart before him. Tell him your whole story, and keep nothing back. Tell him that you are a sinner wanting to be saved from the world, the flesh and the devil, and treat him to save you. That blessed Saviour gave himself for us that he might deliver us from this present evil world. Galatians 1, 2. He knows what the world is, for he lived in its thirty and three years. He knows what the difficulties of a man are, for he was made man for our sakes, and dwelt among men. High in heaven at the right hand of God, he is able to save to the uttermost all who come to God by him. Able to keep us from the evil of the world while we are still living in it. Able to give us power to become the sons of God. Able to keep us from falling. Able to make us more than conquerors. Once more I say, go direct to Christ with the prayer of faith, and put yourself wholly and unreservedly in his hands. Hard as it may seem to you now to come out from the world and be separate, you shall find that with Jesus nothing is impossible. You, even you, shall overcome the world. Free. My third and last word shall be encouragement. If you have learned by experience what it is to come out from the world, I can only say to you, take comfort and persevere. You are in the right road. You have no cause to be afraid. The everlasting hills are in sight. Your salvation is nearer than when you believed. Take comfort and press on. No doubt you have had many a battle and made many a false step. You sometimes felt ready to faint and being half disposed to go back to Egypt. But your master has never entirely left you, and he will never suffude with tempted above that you are able to bear. Then persevere steadily in your separation from the world and never be ashamed of standing alone. Settle it firmly in your mind that the most decided Christians are always the happiest. And remember that no one ever said at the end of his course that he had been too holy and lived too near to God. Here, last of all, what is written in the Scriptures of Truth. Whosoever shall confess me before men. Him shall the Son of Man also confess before the angels of God. Luke 12.8. There is no man that have left house or brethren or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands of my sake and the Gospels. But he shall receive a hundredfold now in this time. Houses and brethren and sisters and mothers and children and lands of persecutions in the world to come eternal life. Mark 10 29 30. Cast not away there for your confidence which have great recompense of reward. For ye have need of patience that after ye have done the will of God he might receive the promise. For yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry. Hebrews 10 35 to 37. Those words have written and spoken for our sakes. Let us lay hold on them and never forget them. Let us persevere to the end and never be ashamed of coming out from the world and being separate. We may be sure it brings its own reward. Note Fortfall and intelligent readers will probably observe that under the head of worldly amusements I have said nothing about ball going and card playing. They are delicate and difficult subjects and many classes of society are not touched by them. But I am quite willing to give my opinion and am also because I do not speak of them without experience in the days of my youth. A. Concerning ball going. I only ask Christians to judge the amusement by its tendencies and accompaniments. To say there is anything morally wrong in the mere bodily act of dancing would be absurd. David danced before the Ark. Solomon said there is a time to dance. Ecclesiastes 3 4. Just as it is natural to lambs and kittens to frisk about. So it seems natural to young people all over the world to jump about to a lively tune in music. If dancing were taken up for mere exercise. If dancing took place at early hours and men only danced with men and women with women it would be needless and absurd to object to it. But everybody knows that this is not what is meant by modern ball going. This is an amusement which involves very late hours. Extravagant dressing and an immense amount of frivolity. Vanity, jealousy, unhealthy excitement and vain conversation. Who would like to be found in a modern ballroom when the Lord uses Christ comes a second time? Who that has taken much part in balls as I myself once did before I knew better can deny that they have a most dispiriting effect on the mind like opium eating and drum drinking on the body. I cannot withhold my opinion and a ball going is one of those worldly amusements which war against the soul and which it is wisest and best to give up. And as for those parents who urge their sons and daughters against their wills and inclinations to go to balls I can only say that they are taking on themselves the most dangerous responsibility and risking great injury to their children's souls. B. B. Cursing in card playing. My judgement is much the same. I ask Christian people to try by its tendencies and consequences. Of course it would be nonsense to say that there is a positive wickedness in an innocent game of cards for diversion and not for money. I have known instances of old people of lethargic and infirm habit of body unable to work or read. To him cards in an evening were really are useful to keep them from drowsiness and to preserve their health. But it is vain to shut our eyes to facts. If masters and mistresses once begin to play cards in the parlour servants are likely to play cards in the kitchen and then comes in a whole train of evils. Or other from simple card playing to desperate gambling there is but a chain of steps. If parents teach young people that there is no harm in the first step they must never be surprised if they go on to the last. I give this opinion with much diffidence. I lay no claim to infallibility. Let every one be persuaded in his own mind. Considering all things it is my deliberate judgement that the Christian who wishes to keep his soul right and to come out from the world would do wisely to have nothing to do with card playing. It is a habit which seems to grow on some people so much that it becomes at last a necessity and they cannot live without it. Madam said to remain to an old lady at bath who declared she could not do without her cards. Madam if this is the case cards are your god and your god is a very poor one. Surely in doubtful matters like these it is well to give our souls the benefit of the doubt and to refrain. C. concerning field sports. I admit that it is not easy to lay down a strict rule. I cannot go to this length for some and say that galloping across country or shooting a grouse, partridges or pheasants or catching salmon or trout are in themselves positively sinful occupations and distinct marks of an unconverted heart. There are many persons I know that are in violent outdoor exercise and complete diversion of mind are absolute necessities of the preservation of their bodily and mental health but in all these matters the chief question is one of degree. Much depends on the company men are thrown into and extent to which the thing is carried. The great danger lies in excess. It is possible to be intemperate about hunting and shooting as well as about drinking. We are commanded and scripture to be temperate in all things if we would so run as to obtain and those who are addicted to field sports could not forget this rule. The question however is one about which Christians must be careful in expressing an opinion and moderate in their judgments. The man who can either ride nor shoot nor throw a fly is hardly qualified to speak dispassionately about such matters. It is cheap and easy work to condemn others for doing things which you cannot do yourself and are utterly unable to enjoy. One thing only is perfectly certain all in temperance or excess is sin. The man who is wholly absorbed in field sports and spends all his years in such a manner that he seems to think God only created him to be a hunting, shooting and fishing animal is a man who at present knows very little of scriptural Christianity. It is written where your treasure is there will your heart be also. Matthew 6 21 End of chapter 12