 Dedication and Preface of Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists About Their Lord This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Larry Wilson. Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists About Their Lord by Bramwell Booth Dedication As Man He Suffered As God He Talked To My Wife Preface The present volume contains some of the papers bearing on the birth and death and work of our Lord Jesus Christ, which I have contributed from time to time to Salvation Army periodicals. I hope that in this form they may continue the service of souls which I am assured they began to render when one by one they were first published. Much in them has, I do not doubt, come to me directly or indirectly by inspiration or suggestion of other writers and speakers, and I desire therefore to acknowledge my indebtedness to the living both inside and outside our borders as well as to the holy dead. Bramwell Booth, Barnet, May 19, 8 End of Preface Chapter 1 of Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists About Their Lord This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tom Hirsch. Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists About Their Lord by Bramwell Booth Chapter 1 The Man for the Century Number 1. The Need The new century has its special need. The need of the twentieth century will be men in every department of the world's life or labor. That is the great want. In religion, in politics, in science, in commerce, in philanthropy, in government, all other necessities are unimportant by comparison with this one. Given men of a certain type, and the religious life of the world will thrive and throb with the love and will of God, and overcome all opposition, given men of the right stamp, and politics will become another word for benevolence. Provided true men are available, science will take her place as the Handmaid of Revelation. If only men of power and principle are at hand, commerce will prosper as she has never yet prospered, rooted in the great law which Christ laid down for her. Do unto others, as ye would that they should do unto you. If the men are found to guide it, philanthropy will become a golden ladder of opportunity by which all in misfortune and misery may climb, not only to sufficiency and happiness here, but to purity and plenty for ever. And given the men of heart, head, and hand for the task, the government of the kingdoms of this world will yet become a fulfillment of the great prayer of Jesus. Thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven. But all or nearly all depends on the men. Number two, the man. The new century will demand men. But if men, then certainly a man. Human nature has, after all, more influence over human nature than anything else. Abstract laws are of little moment to us until we see them in actual operation. The law of gravitation is but a matter of intelligent wonder while we view its influence in the movements of revolving planets or falling stars. But when we see a baby fall terror-stricken from its little cradle to the floor, the attraction of large bodies for small ones takes on a new and heartfelt meaning. The beauty of devotion to truth in the face of opposition hardly stirs an emotion in many of us as we regarded from the safe distance of our own self-satisfied liberty. But when we see the lonely martyr walk with head erect through the raging mob and kiss the stake to which he is soon to be bound, when we watch him burn until the kindly powder explodes about his neck and sends him to exchange his shirt of flame for the robe he has washed in the blood of the lamb, then the beauty, the sincerity, the greatness, the godlikeness of sacrifice, especially of sacrifice for the truth, comes home to us and captures even the coldest hearts and the dullest minds. The revelation of Jesus in the flesh was a recognition of this principle. The purpose of his life and death was to manifest God in the flesh that he might attract man to God. He took human nature that human nature might see the best of which it was capable. He became a man that men might know to what heights of power a man might rise. He became a man that men might know to what lengths and breaths of love and wisdom a man might attain. He became a man that men might know to what depths of love and service a man might reach. The men we need then for the twentieth century will find the pattern man ready to their hand. Be the demands of the coming years what they may, God is able to raise up men to meet them. Men after his own likeness, men of right, men of light, men of might, men who will follow him in the desperate fight with the hydroheaded monsters of evil of every kind, and who will by his name deliver the souls of men from the slavery of sin and the hell to which it leads. Number three, standards. The new century will demand high standards both of character and conduct. Explain it how we may. The fact is evident that religion has greatly disappointed the world. The wretched distortion of Christ's teaching which appears in the lives and businesses of tens of thousands of professed Christians, the namby-pambyism of the massive Christian teachers towards the evil of sin, and the unholy union in nearly all the practical proceedings of life between the world and the bulk of the Christian churches, no doubt largely account for this so far as Christianity is concerned. Mohammedanism is in a still worse plight. For though alas it increases even faster than Christianity, it is helpless at the heart. The mass of its devotees know that between its highest teaching and its best practice, there is a great gulf, and they are slowly beginning to look elsewhere for rules by which to guide their lives. And what is true of Mohammedanism is true also of Buddhism, the great religion of the East. Its teachers have largely ceased to be faithful to their own faith, and as a consequence that faith is a declining power. Beautiful as much of its teaching undoubtedly is. Millions who are nominally Buddhist are estranged by its failures, and are with increasing unrest looking this way and that for help in the battle with evil, and for hope amidst the bitter consciousness of sin. Such is a cursory view of the attitude of the opening century towards the great faiths of the world. Perhaps one word more than another sums it all up, especially as regards Christianity. And that word is neglect. Cold, stony neglect. And yet men are still demanding standards of life and conduct. The open materialist, the timid agnostic, no less than the avowedly selfish, the vicious and the vile, are asking with a hundred tongues and in a thousand ways, who will show us any good? The universal conscience, unbribed, unstifled as on the fateful day in Eden, conscience, the only thing in man left standing erect when all else fell, still cries out, you ought, still rebels at evil, still compels the human heart to cry for rules of right and wrong, and still urges man to the one and withholds him from the other. And it is for one reason, because Jesus can provide these high standards for men, that I say he is the man for the century. The laws he has laid down in the Gospels, and the example he furnished of obedience to those laws in the actual stress and turmoil of a human life, afford a standard capable of universal application. The ruler contending with unruly men, the workman fighting for consideration from a greedy employer, the outcast struggling like an Ishmaelite with society for a crust of bread, the dark-skinned, sad-eyed mother sending forth her only babe to perish in the waters of the sacred river of India, thus giving the fruit of her body for the sin of her soul. The proud and selfish noble abounding in all he desires except the one thing needful, the great multitude of the sourful which no man can number, who refuse to be comforted, the dying whose death will be an unwilling leap in the dark. All these, yea and all others, may find in the law of Christ that which will harmonize every conflicting interest, which will solve the problems of human life, which will build up a holy character, which will gather up and sanctify everything that is good in every faith and in every man, and will unite all who will obey it in the one great brotherhood of the one fold and the one shepherd. Number four, liberty. The new century will call for freedom in every walk of human life. That bright dream of the ages, liberty, how far ahead of us she still lies. What a bondage life is to multitudes. What a vast host of the human race, even of this generation, will die in slavery. Actual physical bondage. Slaves in Africa, in China, in Eastern Europe, in the far aisles of the sea and dark places of the earth cry to us and perish while they cry. What a host still larger are in the bondage of unequal laws. Little children, stricken, cursed, and damned, and there is none to deliver. Young men and maidens bound by hateful customs, ruined by wicked associations, torn by force of law from all that is best in life, and taught all that is worst. Nine men out of ten in one of the great European armies are said to be debauched morally and physically by their military service, and all the men in the nation are bound by law to serve. What a host larger again than both the others of every generation of men are bound by custom in the service of cruelty. It is supposed that every year a million little children die from neglect, willful exposure, or other form of cruelty. Think of the bondage of those who kill them. Look at the cruelty to women, the cruelty of war, the cruelty to criminals, the cruelty to animal creation. What a mighty force the slavery of cruel customs still remains. All that is best in man is crying out for emancipation from this bondage, and I know of no deliverance so sure, so complete, so abiding as that which comes by the teaching and spirit of Jesus. But even if freedom from all these hateful bonds could come and could be complete without him, there still remains a serfdom more degrading, a bondage more inexorable than any of these. For men are everywhere the bond slaves of sin. Look out upon the world, upon your own part of it, even upon your own family or household, and see how evil holds men by one chain or another, and grips them body and soul. This one by doubt, this by passion, this by envy, this by lust, this by pride, this by strife, this by fear, this one by love of gold, this one by love of the world, and this one by hatred of God. Is it not so? What men want, then, is personal, individual liberty from sin. Given that, and a slave may be free. Given that, and the child in the nursery of iniquity may be free. Given that, and the young man or maiden held in the churnal house of lust may be free. Given that, and the victim of all that is most cruel and most brutal in life may still be free. O blessed be God, he whom the Son makes free is free indeed. This and this alone is the liberty for the new century. The gospel liberty from sin for the individual soul and spirit without respect of time or circumstance. And here alone is he who can bestow it. Jesus, the lion of the tribe of Judah. This, I say, is the man for the new century. Number five, knowledge. The new century will be marked by a universal demand for knowledge. One of the most remarkable features of the present time is the extraordinary thirst for knowledge in every quarter of the world. It is not confined to this continent or that. It is not peculiar to any special class or age. It is universal. One aspect of it, and a very significant one, is the desire for knowledge about life and its origin, about the beginnings of things, about the earth and its creation, about the work which we say God did, which he alone could do, all how men search and explore, how they read and think, how they talk and listen. Where one book was read a generation ago, a hundred, I should think, are read now. And for one newspaper then read, there are now probably a thousand. Every man is an inquiry agent, seeking news, information or instruction, seeking to know what will make life longer for him and his, and above all, what can make it happier. And here again I say that Jesus is the man for the new century. He has knowledge to give, which none other can provide. I do not doubt that universities and schools and governments and great press can and will do much to impart knowledge of all sorts to the world, but when it comes to knowledge that can serve the great end for which the very power to acquire knowledge was created, namely the true happiness of man, then I say that Jesus is the source of that knowledge, that without him it cannot be found or imparted, and that with him it comes in its liberating and enlightening glory. I'll be sure you have that. No amount of learning will stand you in its stead. No matter how you may have stored your mind with the riches of the past or tutored it to grapple with the mysteries of the present, unless you know him it will all amount to nothing. But if you know him who is life, that is life eternal. Knowledge without God is like a man learned in all the great mysteries of light and heat who has never seen the sun. He may understand perfectly the laws which govern them, the results which follow them, the secrets which control their action on each other, all that is possible, and yet he will be in the dark. So too knowledge, learning, human education and wisdom are all possible to man. He may even excel in them so as to be a wonder to his fellows by reason of his vast stores of knowledge, and yet know nothing of that light within the mind by which he apprehends them. Nay more he may even be a marvelous adept in the theory of religion, and yet alas alas may never have seen its sun, may still be in the blackness of gross darkness, because he knows not Jesus, the light of the world whom to know is life eternal. Number 6. Government. The new century will demand governors. Every thoughtful person who considers the subject must be struck by the modern tendency towards personal government all over the world. Whatever may be the form of national government prescribed by the various constitutions, it tends, when carried into practice, to give power and authority to individual rulers. Whether in monarchies like England where parliament is really the ruling power, or in republics like France and the United States where what are called democratic institutions are seen in their maturity, or in empires like Germany and Austria, the same leading facts appear. Power goes into the hands of one or two who, whether as ministers or presidents or monarchs, are the real rulers of the nation. Perfect laws, liberal institutions, patriotic sentiments, though they may elevate, can never rule a people. A crowd of legislators, no matter how devoted to a nation, can never permanently control, though they may influence it. Out of the crowd will come forth one or two, generally one commanding personality, strong enough to stand alone, though wise enough not to attempt it. In him will be focused the ideas and ambitions of the nation. To him the people's hearts will go out, and from him they will take the word of command as their virtual ruler. It has ever been so. It is so today. It will always be so. And as with the nations so with individuals, every man must have a king. Call him what we will, recognize him or not. Every man is the subject of some ruler. And this will, if possible, be more manifest in the future than in the past. Men will not be satisfied to serve ideas, to live for the passing ambitions of their day. They will cry out for a king. Am I wrong when I say that Jesus is the coming king? In him are assembled in the highest perfection, all the great qualities which go to make the king of men. And so the new century will need him, must have him. Nay, it cannot prosper without him. The divine man, for he is the rightful sovereign of every human soul. Number 7. A New Force The new century will demand great moral forces, as well as high ideals. Nothing is more evident than that the forms and ceremonies of religion are rapidly losing, in nominally Christian countries, all real influence over the lives of men. The form of godliness without the power is not only the greatest of all shams, but it is the most easily detected. Hence it is that a large part of mankind is either disgusted to hostility or utterly estranged from the real religion by theories and ceremonials, which though they may continue to exist in shadow, have lost their life and soul. For example, the old lie that money paid to a church can buy indulgences, which will release men in the next world from the penalty of sin committed in this. And the miserable theory which made God the direct author of eternal damnation to our lost, are among the theories which, though they are still taught and professed here and there, have long ago ceased to have real influence over men's hearts or actions. In the same way there are multitudes who still conform to the outward ceremony of confirmation, upon whose salvation from sin or separation from the world, that ceremony has absolutely no influence whatever, although for custom's sake they submit to it. But a greater danger than this lies in the fact that it is possible to hold and believe the truth, and yet to be totally ignorant of its power. Sound doctrine will of itself never save a soul. A man may believe every word of the faith of a churchman or a salvationist, and yet be as ignorant of any real experience of religion as an infidel or an idolater. And it is this merely intellectual or sentimental holding of the truth about God and Christ, about holiness and heaven, which makes the ungodly mass look upon Christianity as nothing more than an opinion or a trade, a something with which they have no concern. The new century will demand something more than this. Men will require something beyond creeds, be they ever so correct, and traditions be they ever so venerable, and sacraments be they ever so sacred. They will ask for an endowment of power to grapple with what they feel to be base in human nature, and to master what they know is selfish and sinful in their own hearts. And right here the man for the century comes forward. The doctrine of Jesus is the spirit of a new life. It is a transforming power. Men may believe that the American Republic is the purest and noblest form of government on the earth, and may give himself up to live and fight and die for it, and yet be the same man in every respect as he was before. But if he believes with his heart that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and gives himself up to live and fight and die for him, he will become a new man. He will be a new creature. The acceptance of the truth and acting upon it, in the one case, will make a great change in his manner of life, his conduct. The acceptance of the truth and acting upon it, in the other, will make a great change in the man himself, in his tastes and motives, in his very nature. Again I say this is what we shall need for the new century. Not good laws only, but the power to observe them. Not beautiful and lofty ideals only, but the power to translate them into the daily practice of common lives. Not merely the glorious examples of pure faith, but the actual force which enables men to live by that faith amid the littleness, the depression, the contamination, and the conflict of an evil world. Number 8. Atonement. The new century will demand an atonement for sin. The consciousness of sin is the most enduring fact of human experience. From generation to generation, from age to age, amid the ceaseless changes which time brings to everything else, this one great fact remains, persists. The condemning consciousness of sin. It appears with men in the cradle and goes with them to the tomb. Without regard to race or language or creed, it is ever with us. It was this robbed Eden of its joys. It is this makes life a round of labor and sorrow. It is this gives death its terrors. It is this makes the place of torment which men call hell. For the unceasing consciousness of sin will be the worm that never dies. All attempts to explain it away, to modify its miseries, to extract its sting, whether they have come from the party of unbelief, or the party of education, or the party of amusement have failed, and failed utterly. No matter what men say or do to get rid of it, there it is, staring them in the face. Whether they look amongst the most highly civilized people or amongst the lowest savages, whether they look into the past history of mankind or into its present condition, there is the stupendous fact of sin, and there is the incontrovertible fact that everywhere men are conscious of it. It is going to be so in this twentieth century. If God, in His mercy, allows the families of men to continue during another hundred years, this great fact will still stand out in the forefront of life. Sin will still be the skeleton at every feast. The horrid ghost haunting every home and every heart. The specter clothed with reproaches, ever ready to plunge his dripping sword into every breast. Sin, the world's sin. The sin of this one generation. The sin of one city. The sin of one family. The sin of one man. My sin. Ah, depend upon it, the twentieth century will cry aloud, What shall be done with our sin? Yet thanks be to God there is an atonement. The man of whom I write has made a propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. He stands forth the only Saviour. None other has ever dared, even to offer to the sin-stricken hearts of men, relief from the guilt of sin. But he does. He can cleanse. He can pardon. He can purify. He can save, because He has redeemed. Thou wast slain and hast redeemed us unto God by thy blood, out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation. Will you come and join in our great world mission of making his atonement known? Will you turn your back on the littleness and selfishness and cowardice of the past, and arise in the strength of the God-man to publish to all you can reach by tongue and pen an example that there is a sacrifice for men's sins, for the worst, for the most wretched, for the most tortured? As you set your face with high resolve toward the unknown years, take your stand with the man for all the ages, and let this be your message, your confidence, your hope for all men. Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. End of chapter 1, Recording by Tom Hirsch. The Birth of Jesus For unto you is born a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. Luke 2.11 The firstborn among many brethren. Romans 8.29 The birth of Jesus is one of the great signs of his condescension, and no matter how we view it, is perhaps scarcely less wonderful than his death. If the one manifests his glorious divinity, then the other exalts his wonderful humanity. If Calvary and the Resurrection reveal his power, does not Bethlehem make manifest his love, and did not both the former come out of the latter, the infinite glory which belongs to the cross and the tomb had its rise in the gloom of the stable. If the babe had not been laid in a manger, then the man would not have been nailed to the tree, and the Lamb that was slain would not have taken his place on the everlasting throne. I claim therefore a little more attention to the events which relate to the Saviour's birth, and to the lessons which may be derived from them, and though perhaps something of what I have to say will have already occurred to some who read this paper, I will venture to suggest one or two thoughts as they have been presented to my own mind. This simplicity has made them of service to me. 1. He came. The nature of the whole work of our redemption is made manifest by the one fact. He really came. His everlasting love, his infinite compassion, his all-embracing purpose were from eternity. But we only got to know of it because he came. If he had contented himself with sending messages or highly placed messengers, or even with making occasional and wonderful excursions of divine revelation, man would no doubt have been greatly attracted, and perhaps even helped somewhat in his tremendous conflict with evil. Yet he might never have been subdued and willed. He might never have been touched and won back to God. He might never have been brought down from his pride to cry out, my Lord and my God. No, it was his coming to us that brought conviction of sin and then conviction of the truth in our hearts. He came himself. There is something very wonderful in this principle of contact as illustrated by the life of Jesus. Just as to save the human race, he felt it necessary to come into it and clothe himself with its nature and conform himself to its natural laws. So all the way through his earthly journey, he was constantly seeking to come into touch with the people. He desired to bless. He touched the sick. He fed the hungry. He placed his fingers on the blind eyes and put them upon the ears of the deaf and touched them with the tongue of the dumb. He took the ruler's dead daughter by the hand and the maid arose. He lifted the little children up into his arms and blessed them. He stretched forth his hand to sink him Peter. He stood close by the foul-smelling body of the dead Lazarus. He took the bread and with his own hands break it and gave it to his disciples at that last farewell meal. He even took poor Thomas' trembling hand and guided it to the prince in his own hands and the wounds in his side. Yes, indeed, it is written large in every part of his life that he really came and that he came very near to lost and suffering men. Is there not a lesson here for us, my comrade, as he is in the world, so will we? This principle in his life was not by accident or by chance. It was an essential qualification of his nature for the work entrusted to him. It is a necessary qualification for those who are called to carry on that work. Is this, then, the impression you are able to give to those among whom you labor that you have come to them in very truth that in mind and body and hand and heart you are seeking to come into the closest contact of love and sympathy with them, especially with those who need you most? O, aim at this. Do not for your sake as well as for your masters move about amid your own people or among those to whom God and the army have given you entrance as one who has little in common with them, who does not know them, who does not feel with them. Go into their houses, put your hands sometimes to their burdens, take a share in their toils, nurse their sick, weep with them that week, and rejoice with them that rejoice. Make them feel that it is your own religion rather than the army system that has made you come to them. Let them see by your sympathy and kindness that love is the overmastering influence in your life, the influence that has brought you to them. Compel them to turn to you as a warm-hearted, unselfish example of the truths you preach. Let them feel that you are indeed come from God to take them by the hand as far as may be and lead them through this veil of tears to the city of light and rest. Two, his humble origin. Everything associated with the advent of Jesus seems to have been specially ordered to mark his humiliation. It is true that Mary, his mother, was of the lineage of King David, but her relationship with the royal house was a very distant one, and the family had fallen upon sad times. The Romans were masters in the land, and a stranger sat upon the throne of Israel. Mary, therefore, was but a poor village maiden. Joseph, her betrothed husband, was a carpenter, an ordinary working man. Bethlehem, the place of the Savior's birth, was a tiny, straggling village, which, though not the least, was certainly one of the least of the villages of Judea. In Nazareth, where he grew from infancy to childhood, and from youth to manhood, was another little hamlet among the hilly country to the north of Jerusalem, and was held in low repute by the people of those days. The occupation chosen for the early life of Jesus was a humble one. He learned the trade of a joiner and worked with Joseph at the carpenter's bench. His associates and friends were of the village community, and he whose name is above every name passed to and fro and in and out among the cottage homes of the poor as one of themselves. Probably none but his mother had in those early days any true idea of the mysterious promise which had been given concerning him. What a contrast it all presents to the years of stress and storm and a victory which were to follow and to the supreme influences teaching and examples were to exert in the world. Is there not something here for us? Do not the lowly origin and simple country habits and humble tastes of some of our comrades make them hesitate on the threshold of great efforts when they ought to leap forward in the strength of their God? Let them remember their master and take courage. Let them call to mind the unfashionable, uneducated, uncultivated surroundings of Nazareth. Let them bear in mind the carpenter's shed, the rough country work, the bare equipment of the village home, the humble service of the family life. Let them above all remember the plain and gentle mother and the meek and lowly one himself and in this remembrance let them go forward. To be of lowly origin or of a mean occupation, to come out of poverty and want, to be looked down upon by the rich or the powerful ones of earth, to be treated as of no consequence by governments and rulers, and yet to go on doing and daring, suffering and conquering for God and right. What is all this but the fulfillment of Paul's words? And base things of the world and things which are despised and chosen, and things which are not to bring to naught things that are, that no flesh should glory in his presence. Nay, what is all but to tread in the very steps that the master trod. Three, his high nature. But if on the human side our redeemer's origin and circumstances were of the humblest and we were thus enabled to see his humanity as it were face to face, there was united with it the divine nature so that as our doctrines say, he is true and properly God and he is truly and properly man. Many mysteries meet by the side of that manger. Some of them to remain mysteries so far as human understanding can grapple with things till God himself reveals them to our stronger vision in the world to come. But blessed be God, some things we cannot compass and mental powers are very grateful to our hearts. How doused, canced, loved me as I am, yet be the God thou art, his darkness to my intellect, but sunshine to my heart. And we to whom the living Christ has spoken the word of life in liberty, although we may not now fully comprehend this great wonder of all wonders God manifest in the flesh, it may not be able effectively to make it plain to others, we cannot for ourselves doubt its central truth, that God dwelt with man. Here was indeed a perfect union of two spirits. There was the suffering and obedient spirit of the true man. There was the unchanging and holy spirit of the true God. It was a union, it was a unity, it was God and man, it was man and God. It was a being of infinite might and perfect moral beauty sent forth from the bosom of the Father and yet a being of lowly and sensitive tenderness having roots in our poor human nature, tempted in all points like as we are and touched with the feelings of all our infirmities. Is it not to something of the same kind we are called? Is not every true Salvation Army officer designed by God to be also, not of course in the same degree but still up to the measure of his own capacity and of his master's will, a dual or twofold creature with associations and roots and attachments and all that is human and yet with divine life, divine spirit, divine love, divine zeal, divine power, divine fire, united with him and dwelling in him. The perfect man would have been a great marvel, a great teacher, a great prophet, but without the God he could never have been the perfect Savior. The divine without the human would have been an awe inspiring fact a spectacle of holiness too great for human eyes but he could not have been a Savior. If it were possible for us to conceive the one without the other we should certainly not find a Jesus and either. And so you are merely human officer, no matter how pure, how strong, how thoughtful, how clever, how industrious will fail and ever fail and even so the officer who is lost in visionary seeking after the divine alone to the neglect of action of duty, of law, of self-denial, of the common conflicts and contracts of man will equally fail and always fail. It is the man we want, the man but the man born of the Spirit, the man but the man full of the Holy Ghost, the man but the man with Pentecost blazing in his head and heart and soul. Comrade, what are you? Are you striving to be a prophet without possessing the Spirit of the prophets? Are you trying to be a priest without the priestly baptism? Are you laboring to be a king without the divine anointing? Beware! 4. From Infancy to Manhood 1. Birth implies the weakness, the dependence, the ignorance of infancy, but it implies also the promise of growth, of increase, of advance from infancy to manhood. Thus it is with man generally, so it was with the son of man. First he was wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger. Presently he goes forth in his mother's arms into Egypt and back to Egypt. By and by it is written that the child grew and waxed strong in spirit and the grace of God was upon him. Then he is found in the temple asking that wonderful question about his father's business and at last we find him increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man. We know also that he was found in fashion as a servant and was obedient of the devil in that he learned obedience by the things that he suffered. In fact, a very slight acquaintance with the history of his life reveals the truth that in some wonderful way he steadily grew in wisdom and grace in the power to love and to serve and in strength the grapple was sin and death all the while he journeyed from the cradle to the grave and the victory beyond. His life was a discipline in the very degree. Most of the hopes he might rightly entertain about the success of his works were dashed. Much of his love for those around him was disappointed and his trust betrayed. He was despised where he should have been honored, rejected where he should have been received. He came unto his own and his own received him not. Not this man they cried, but Barabbas. But out of it all he came forth perfect and fair, lacking nothing. The chiefest among ten thousand be altogether lovely. It may be a mystery, but it is a fact all the same, that the more precious and wondrous and eternal jewel was cut and cut again, the more the light and glory of the day spring from on high was made manifest to men. And here also I find a word of help and courage and cheer for you and me, my precious friend. I am not sure that you could receive any more valuable Christmas gift than the full realization of the truth, that your advance from the infancy to the manhood of your life in God will not be hindered and delayed, but rather will be helped and quickened by the storms and trials, the conflicts and sufferings which will overtake you. It was so with the man Christ Jesus. It has been so with him chosen. As he, our dear Lord, was made perfect through suffering, so are his saints. We are chosen in the furnace of affliction and often cast into one too, and yet he who chooses all our changes might have spared us every trial and conflict and taken us to victory without a battle and to rest without a toil. But he knows better what will make us men, and it is men he wants to glorify men, not babes. The dark valleys of bitterness and loneliness are often better for us than the land of Bayoula. A certain queen once sitting for her portrait commanded that it should be painted without shadows. Without shadows said the astonished artist, I fear your majesty is not acquainted with the laws of light and beauty. There can be no good portrait without shading. No more can there be darkness without trial and sorrow and storm. There might perhaps remain a stunted and unfruitful infant life, but a man in Christ Jesus, a soldier of the cross, a leader of God's people without tribulation there can never be. Patience, experience, faith, hope, love if they do not actually grow from tribulations are helped by them in their growth. For what says the apostle tribulation worketh patience and patience experience and experience hope and hope maketh not ashamed. The finest pine trees grow in the stormiest lands. The tempests make them strong. Surgeons tell us that their greatest triumphs are often those in which the patience have suffered most at their hands. For every stroke of the knife is to heal. The child you most love you most anxiously correct and whom the Lord loveth he chaseneth. O, do believe that by every blow of disappointment and sorrow he permits to fall upon you. He is striving to bring you to the measure of the statue of a man in Christ Jesus. Do work with him in the full knowledge that he will not forsake you. He the man who is penetrated to the heart of every form of sorrow is to bless him there. He who is watched in silence by every kind of earthly grief and found its antidote, the man who trod the wine-press alone, he will be with you. And since he is with you, see to it you acquit yourself well in his presence. It is related of an old Highland chief that when advancing to give battle he fell at the head of his clan, pierced by two balls from the foe. His men began to waver. But then their wounded captain instantly raised himself on his elbow, and would blood streaming from his wounds claim children, I am not dead. I am looking to see if you do your duty. My comrade, this is the path of progress, the way of advance from the littleness and weakness of infancy to the battles and victories of manhood. It is the way of duty and your captain in his hands and his sides is looking on. End of Chapter 2 Chapter 3 of Our Master Thoughts for Salvation as about their Lord. This is a LibriVox recording while LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Our Master Thoughts for Salvation as about their Lord by well-booth. Contrast at Bethlehem The birth and infancy of Jesus, notwithstanding that Christmas time comes around again and again, receive less attention than they deserve, owing no doubt to the interest attached to the events of his manhood and death. Nevertheless, they suggest some useful lessons, especially to those of us who have much to do with the weak and trembling and are ourselves, alas, often weak and trembling too. May I offer one or two thoughts on the subject which, though quite simple, have proved a blessing to my own heart. First, great weakness may be quite consistent with true greatness and goodness. It is unnecessary to dwell even for a moment on the weakness of the infant Jesus. The Scripture has left no possible doubt about it. Unable to speak, to walk, indeed, to do anything for himself. Weak with all the weakness of the human race. Yea, more truly helpless than a young bird or a tiny worm. The holy child was weighed in the manger hard by the beast that perished. And yet we know that there was the Divine Son, the express image of the Father, the everlasting King, the enthroned One, the Creator, without whom was not anything made that was made. It is indeed a contrast which first distounds us and then compels our adoration and love. Our God is a consuming fire. Our God is a little child. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And yet he is there fashion as a babe for whom and all his sweet innocence they cannot find a room in the crowded inn. Yes, my friend, to be weak, to be small, to be sadly unfit for the strives of time, to feel weary and unequal to the hard battles of life, to realize that you were pushed out and away by the crowd, to be contemptuously forgotten by the multitude shouting and singing across the road, all this may be your case. And yet you may be God's chosen vessel, intended, framed, to suffer and triumph with him. You, even you, may be destined by his wisdom to fill for him some great place in action against the hosts of iniquity and unbelief. Above all you may be appointed by God the Father to be like his Son with a holy likeness of will, of affection, of character. For indeed weakness in many things is not inconsistent with goodness and purity and love. The manger has in this also a message for us. Out of that mystery of helplessness came forth the lion heart of love which led him for us to the wine press alone, the which while we were yet rebels, loved us with an everlasting love going for us to a lonely and shameful death. Take heart then remembering that it is out of weakness we are to be made strong. Be of good courage. Today may be the day of the enemy's strength when you are constrained to cry out, this is your hour and the power of darkness. But tomorrow will be yours. The weakness and humiliation of the stable must go before the mount of transfiguration, the mount of Calvary, the resurrection glory, and the exultation of the Father's throne. Take heart. Second, a condition of complete dependence may be quite consistent with a great vocation, the call that is to a great work. I suppose there is nothing known to man so absolutely dependent upon the help of others as a little child. Life itself begins in total dependence upon another life and is only preserved in still greater dependence on powers outside itself, for air, for light, for heat, for food, for clothes, for comfort, indeed for every needed thing. This is especially the case with a child. The young lions and sheep, the tiny flies and the small fishes, these are able to do something for their own support. But the newborn babe presents complete dependence. And this babe was no exception. What a service of imperishable worth to all the world was rendered by his mother in her loving care of him. And yet we know something of this dependist task to which he came, that little child was to become the greatest example, the greatest teacher, the greatest, the only savior, the greatest healer of the sorrows of men, the greatest benefactor, the greatest ruler and king, upon him and upon his word, who lies there in his virgin mother's arms, dependent on her breast for life and warmth, unnumbered multitudes were to rest their all for this life and the next, tens of thousands in the face of inexpressible agonies were to trust to him their every hope, and for his sake were to die a thousand deaths. Let not then your heart be troubled because you also are so dependent on others, so hedged in by your circumstances, so limited by sickness and pain, so incompetent through inexperience and ignorance, or you are so compelled to stand and wait when you would feign rush on and do or dare for the Lord. All this may be even so, and yet you may be called to share in the same high vocation of your Savior. I read lately of an old saint chained for weary years to a dungeon wall, unable even to feed himself, whose testimony for Jesus was powerful to the deliverance of many of his persecutors. He was killed at last, blessed one by one he should convert into jailers also, who were employed to supply him with food. Are you bound in the same way? Are you chained fast in a strange trial? Are you appointed to serve in what seems like a den of beast? Are you under the compulsion of some injustice? Are you made to feel helpless and useless without the support of those around you? Ah well, do not repine. Do not forget that God's call comes often, oh so often to just such as you, to witness for him in spite of sin, to dare to reprove sin. Above all, do not doubt your God. You may be very dependent today, but you may be more than victorious tomorrow. Third, poverty and friendlessness are often found in company with a great heart. There was no home for Jesus in Bethlehem. There was no room for him in the inn. There was no cradle in the sector when Herod arose to kill. What a strange world it is! Did ever Babe open eyes on such a topsy-turvy condition of affairs? The King of Glory had not where to lay his head. Mary at his true was strong in faith, but both she and Joseph must need soon fly into Egypt with a babe. Refused at the inn, soon even the stable must cast them out. And we who know what it means to be loved of him, what can we say? Our hearts are bowed with something of shame and grief that he thus suffered, and yet we have a secret joy because he suffered so well. For of all the greatnesses of the babe, this is the greatest, the greatest of his heart, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Romanus, the Holy Spirit the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Romanus call it. The all-conquering heart of Jesus, I prefer to name it, for it was his wealth of love that really gave him the victory. Does one read those lines who was poor, who was cast out by those who were dear, who was a stranger in a strange land, who was driven from pillar to post, who was harassed by open foes and wounded by secret Well, to that one let me say, remember your Lord's poverty and friendlessness, remember the tossings up and down of his infancy, the frugal cottage home in Nazareth where in his family was finally gathered, despite its bareness and toil was a place of peace and abundance compared with the stable, the flight into Egypt and the sojourn among aliens there. Are you, dear friend, tempted to complain of your narrow surroundings of your small opportunity to shine before others or of a want of appreciation for your service and gifts and powers by those who should know you? Oh, remember the babe and the long years of his condescension to men of low estate, to the cramped surroundings of the carpenter's shed and the sleepy Jewish village? Are you tempted sometimes because you have to suffer the hatred or jealousy secret or open of those for whom you feel nothing but goodwill and who perhaps once thought themselves happy in your friendship? Well, in such hours remembering your master and the hatred of Herod seeking to kill the child, try to call to mind something of the secret as well as the open bitterness of men, religious and irreligious alike which began to hunt him while yet in swaddling clothes and which hunted him still all through his days. But amissed at all, what a great heart of passionate love was his. Blessed be his name forever, whether the poverty and suffering and hatred were or were not favourable to it. There it was, the great heart of all the world. What about you? Can you ever be again the same since that he loved you? Can you ever be again content to remain little and narrow with interests and affections that are little and narrow also? Will you not rise as he rose above the small ambitions of the spiritual pygmies who meet you at every turn, determined to look beyond your own tiny circle and the low aims of those around you? Depend upon it. You ought to do so. Depend upon it. The Holy Savior can enable you to do so. Depend upon it. The world's great need is great hearts. Will you be one? End of Chapter 3 Chapter 4 of Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists About Their Lord This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Tom Hirsch Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists About Their Lord by Bramwell Booth Chapter 4 Christ Come Again And she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in manger. Luke 2 verse 7 Christ formed in you Galatians 4 verse 19 The life of Jesus Christ in Palestine was a foreshadowing of his life in all who accept him. God appointed him a Savior, not only because he should bring redemption nigh by a sacrifice which he alone could offer, because he was also appointed to be the firstborn of many brethren, to be the head of a new family, the beginning, the new atom, the first of a new line, in which character should cease to be merely human, even though perfect with all human perfections, and should become a union of the human and the divine, in which in fact the body and mind and spirit of man should continue to exhibit the wonder of Christ's incarnation and show forth God clothed with man. The life of Jesus divides itself quite naturally into several distinct periods, each having its own special characteristics and peculiar history. There is his birth and infancy, his childhood, his youth, his manhood, his perfected or completed life following Calvary and the Resurrection, and may we not say his eternal glory, upon which a few of his disciples saw him begin to enter the transcending splendor of the ascension. Every one of these phases or sections of his wonderful experience of earth has its continuing lessons for us. All speak aloud to us of his purposes and plans, and reveal to us the power and force of his inner life in the outward or public appearances and acts which belong to each. God has hidden many things from us, mysteries of nature, of grace, of eternity, but this mystery of God's relations to men, he has exhausted his resources in order to make plain. Before all else, the life of Jesus is a revelation of the minds and methods, the principles and the practices of God as they ought to appear and as they ought to work out amid the surroundings and limitations of humanity. It is to the beginnings of that life to which our thoughts turn at this Christmas season. We dwell with affection on the off-depicted picture and repeat of the off-depicted words the join in the old, old hallelujahs of the shepherds with something of the zest and freshness of a first love. The story is so unlike all others, and touches with such unerring potency cords in the human soul which call it to a higher and nobler life that no matter who gazes upon the babe of Bethlehem he feels a kinship with all the world inhaling the desire of all nations. The manger, the silent companions of the stable, the swaddling clothes what a touch of human tenderness motherliness so to speak, is in that line and wrapped him in swaddling clothes. The adoring shepherds, the star the wise men all thoughts of their wisdom for the moment gone. The gold the frankincense the myrrh, the rejoicing and yet trembling mother the little child we see it all seeing we believe and believing we rejoice. The day-star from on high hath visited us we know in whom we have believed. The great condescension is before us. Strength has made itself dependent on weakness cause upon effect eternity upon time God upon man and he has done it for our sakes. The divine condescension never appears so new and so real to us as when we stand at the side of this lowly cradle here are no high sounding doctrines no hard words no terrible commands no far off thunders of a new Sinai no rumblings of a coming judgment here we see Jesus and Jesus only Jesus showing himself in our very own flesh and blood submitting himself to the weakness of our infirmities voluntarily clothing himself with our ignorance and making God the present tangible possession of the whole human family bringing him very nigh to us in our mouth and in our heart if we can but believe and more than this God joined in that babe his great strength to our great nothingness he bound us to himself he robed us as it were with himself and he robed himself in us henceforth the tabernacle of God is with men henceforth every one of us may be conscious of an inward presence of which we may say holy joy angels and men before him fall and devils fear and fly it is this manifestation of Jesus in his people for which the apostle prays in the words I have quoted my little children of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you nothing less will satisfy him because he knew that nothing less will settle against the power of the world the flesh and the devil in any human heart Christ formed in you Christ born again in them that is his agonized prayer his one hope for them in the workshops of human effort no instruments no skill no motive power exist for the formation and development of character from the energizing vitality of God's spirit dwelling in us he is the indispensable foundation of any goodness or wisdom or beauty that can last purity begins and ends in him faith finds her author and finisher in him truth which is the beauty of the soul is but a reflection of his image and love has no being but in him and so Paul says let him in conformity to his example is only possible by the reformation in you of his life and the growth again in you of his person the mind of Christ in your mind the spirit of Christ in your spirit the presence of Christ in your flesh and blood the motive power of Christ the Father's will prompting your every thought and word and deed thereby transforming your body into a temple of the Son of God and because in this unity of purpose with the Father the Christ of Glory stooped to the infancy and childhood of Nazareth yielding himself completely to the bonds and limits inseparable from the life and conditions of a little child and thinking no humiliation of our nature too deep for his love to tread so he will condescend to the lowest depths of weakness and want revealed in your heart and life he will meet you where you are he will deal with you just where you are weakest and worst this is indeed the keynote of all that God has to show you it is your own link in the long chain of patient and every new revelations of God to man for what is the history of man what is the story the Bible has to tell what is the testimony of all time but that God has ever been speaking to man appearing to man opening now his eyes and now his understanding and now his heart and making an everlastingly new revelation to the soul that God in him is his soul hope of glory and his Christmas message today is still the same to you if you are willing Christ will come as really as sensibly as wonderfully I know a thousand times more so as he came to Mary and to Bethlehem in truth a second coming but in many and wonderful ways like unto the first one the childhood of Jesus was attended by remarkable recognitions of his divinity at his birth at his dedication inherits instant resolve to kill him in the temple with the fathers by many clear tokens men confessed and acknowledged that he was the son of God if he is being formed in you there will be equally definite and not very dissimilar signs of recognition first before all else you will know with Mary that the new life entrusted to you is divine that God has entered into your heart to make all things new it is just the absence of this assurance which stamps so much of the Christianity of the present day in effect a religion without God its professors have no certainty they seek but they do not find they ask but they do not receive they have no foundation in the sanction of their own access to the indwelling person they have no revelation they have in short no God how far even as the east is from the west is this from the glorious confidence with which Mary sang and in which you can join if indeed your Christ is come my soul doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my savior salvation is of the Lord and so is the assurance of it where there is the life of God there will be his witness even in the heart of the weakest and slowest servant of all his household if you are not clear about this first evidence of your Lord's coming let me counsel you that there is something wrong if Christ be formed in you you will assuredly know it beyond the power of men or devils to make you doubt but others than Mary also acknowledge this appearance of God manifest in flesh the shepherds and the wise men Holy Simeon and Herod the king each in his own way adds his own tribute to the new life that had come down to man the shepherds and the strangers from afar bow down and worship strangers perhaps were more ready to rejoice with you than your own kith and kin when first Christ came to you Simeon who had so desired to see the salvation of God sees and is satisfied perhaps some Simeon had thus watched and waited and wept for you and when the Lord came to his temple he saw it and was ready to depart with joy Herod the king sought to kill the child so it is even now don't be deceived where Christ comes storms come the world of selfishness and power and wealth will kill the divine thing in you if it can the prince of this world and the prince of the world come no truce was possible long ago in quiet Judea and no truce is possible now the spirit of the world is still the spirit of murder it is called by other names today and under its influence men will tell you that the life of God in you is not to take those forms of violent opposition wrong and of passionate devotion to right and of burning zeal and self-denial for the loss which they took in Jesus the real meaning of their tale is that they are seeking to kill the child but do not be dismayed remember Mary's flight into Egypt the peril of her son made her regardless of her friends of her reputation of her home of her life she must guard that precious life at any cost at any risk at any loss is there not a lesson in her example let nothing let not all the sum total of this world's pleasures and possessions lead you to risk the life of God in your soul listen to no voices that counsel friendship or parlay or compromise with the world the spirit of Herod is in it if you cannot preserve that indwelling without flying from somewhere or something or someone then fly if you cannot guard that presence without losing all then let all be lost and in losing all you shall find more than all two side by side with these evidences of his divinity the infancy and childhood of Jesus revealed his dependence and weakness that is the reality of his human nature the first recorded act of his mother shows us one aspect of that weakness after a fashion which appeals to the tenderest recollections of the whole human family she wrapped him in swaddling clothes and then as though to mark forever the perfection of dependence the history goes on and laid him in a manger there are other equally striking incidents teaching just as clearly that the babe was a babe and that the child was really a child it is the perfect union of him who was and is and is to come with him who flourished as the flower of the field the wind passeth over him and he is gone even so may Christ be formed in you the purity and dignity of his life will be all the more wonderfully glorious in the eyes of men and angels because it is linked with dependence and trial and weakness as it was at Nazareth so it is now hand in hand with divinity walked hunger and weariness poverty disappointment and toil did we think it would be otherwise did we do we sometimes wonder why the road is so rough and the burden so heavy and the sky so dark are we found asking the old question about sitting on the twelve thrones judging those around us and sharing in some way the royal glory of a king and is there an echo of murmuring at these bonds and infirmities and drudgeries of daily duty and common sorrow so did the rabbis of old and in consequence refused him ah the answer to it all is in the one word it was because he was made perfect through suffering it was because he learned obedience by the things he suffered that he must do it again through you in you every energy of your being may thus be sanctified every pain every sorrow every purpose will be not taken away not crushed and hardened into a series of unfeeling forms and empty signs not passed over as having no relation to his life but touched and purified and ennobled with the love and power of an indwelling god yes it is man whom he came to restore it is man whose beauty and power were the glory of creation that drew him with infinite attractions from the center of his father's heaven and plunged him into the center of a very hell of suffering and shame it was man whose nature passing by the angels he took upon him it was man he swore to save he loves our manhood its will its intelligence its emotions its passions and it is our manhood he has redeemed he designs to make men really men to cleanse to restore to indwelling them and finally to present everyone in the beauty of a perfected character the presence of his father without spot or blemish or any such thing it is this great principle of redemption that has found expression in the salvation army we are of those who see in every human being the ruins of the temple of god but ruins which can be repaired and reconstructed that he may fit them for his own possession and then return and make them his abode never listen to that fatal lie that to be a man means of necessity to always be a sinner that humanity is only another word for irreclaimable desert or irreparable despair when the enemy of your soul whispers to you out of his lying heart that because sin has found one of its strongholds in the appetites and propensity of your poor body or in the original perversity of a rebellious spirit and that you cannot be expected to triumph over that evil nature because it is your nature remember Bethlehem and answer him with the promise of god I will dwell in you and walk in you it was because he purposed to cleanse holy body and soul and spirit that he came taking the body and soul and spirit of a man and that he will come again taking your body soul and spirit as his dwelling place 3 the birth and childhood of Jesus were the beginning of his great sacrifice as well as the preparation for it the spirit of Bethlehem and the spirit of Calvary are one he was born for others that he might die for others the mystery of god in the babe was the beginning of the mystery of god on the cross the one was a part of the other of the manger for us they could never have laid him in the tomb that he might taste death for every man and it was because he grew and waxed strong in spirit and increased in wisdom and the grace of god was upon him in those early years that he was able afterwards to tread the wine press alone to work out a perfect example of manhood to wrestle with death and the grave and finally to stand forth for us as the great victorious one conqueror of all our foes and is it not in this same fashion and for this same purpose that Christ is to be formed in us he grew progress is the law of happiness the law of holiness the law of life to stand still is to die it was not enough for the fulfillment of his great mission that he should be born that he should live he must grow let us take that lesson to our hearts in this superficial painted rushing generation let us beware of resting our hope to satisfy the eternal claims of God upon some great event in our spiritual history of long ago it is not enough to have been converted it is not enough to have had the adoption of the father it is not enough to have entered the spiritual family of Christ it is not enough that even Jesus revealed himself in us thousands of false hopes are built on these past events which divinely wrought as they may have been have ceased to possess any vital connection with the life and character of today such a religion is a religion of memory destined to be turned in the presence of the throne to unmixed remorse but how and in what are we to grow in manner and in substance our Lord Jesus grew in strength and stature in wisdom and in grace the grace of God was upon him in spiritual strength and stature that is from the timid babe to the bold and valiant soldier in the power to do the things we ought to do in the ability to obey the inward voice it is by the exercise of the muscles and tendons of the babe that the bodily frame is fitted for the rush and struggle of life it is by the ABC of the infant class that the mind is fitted to comprehend and appreciate the duties and obligations of political social physical and family relationships it is by the humble wail of the penitent and the daily acts of loving help that the soul learns to soar on eagle's wings and shout the truth that God is gracious and to brave difficulty and danger in his service they go forth from strength to strength are you so journeying? in wisdom wisdom is a thing of the heart the brain and the wisdom of God is really a revelation of the love of God to be wise unto salvation is to learn the lesson of love to be wise to win souls is first to love souls to feel that it is more blessed to give than to receive is the fruit of love how different this is from the calculating wisdom of this world dear comrade and friend are you taking care that the divine life in you shall grow after this Christ-like fashion? when I hear Christian people say oh I have so little love so little faith so little joy I generally find that it is so because they stifle and quench the feelings of the divine spirit to seek the souls of others because they leave unanswered the urgings and promptings of duty which God in their conscience is demanding because they neglect prayer and self-denial and heart-searching and the word of God because in short they starve the child what wonder if love and evil and joy is like to die and the grace of God was upon him here was the promise of that entire sacrifice for men which culminated when a man cried out to him on the cross he saved others himself he cannot save it is ever thus that God repeats himself when we are ready to be offered up for the blessing of others then grace will come upon us for the struggle as it came upon him when Christ formed in us finds free course for all his mind and all his passion when our eyes are opened to the great purposes of his life in the salvation of the whole world and when we hear through him the cry of those for whom he was born for whom he died God will pour out on us grace to send us forth grace sufficient grace abundant grace triumphant have you come to this can you say he is thus dwelling in you and working in you to will and to do of his good pleasure do not turn away with the paralyzing fear that you cannot be that the life of Jesus can never be lived out again in flesh and blood remember he is the same yesterday and today and forever all he was in Bethlehem to Mary and Joseph all he was to his workmates at Nazareth all he was in the wilderness fighting with fiends in the deserts feeding the hungry or among the multitude healing the sick blessing the little children casting out devils and preaching the kingdom all he was in Bethlehem weeping over Lazarus and crying Lazarus come forth in the garden of his agony in the darkness of his cross in the hour of his resurrection all this all all he is today he belongs to the everlasting now all he was to the murders who died for his name all he has been to our fathers he is to us and will be to our children for with him is no variableness nor shadow of turning yes this unchanging Christ is in us except we be reprobate the life and image of God and the hope of glory End of Chapter 4 Recording by Tom Hirsch Chapter 5 of Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists about their Lord This is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Patty Marie Our Master Thoughts for Salvationists about their Lord by Bramwell Booth The Secret of His Rule For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin Hebrews Chapter 4 Verse 15 We hail the Christmas season as the anniversary of our King's birth our eyes turn to the manger and our hearts to marry for a thousand and one reasons but the chiefest is that Jesus was born in Bethlehem as the Divine Son and the Royal Branch Although we know that many shadows darken the way of the cross and that it is roughened by many thorns and agonies many dark descents and weary struggles we have always the assurance that at the end and at the right time there will be a crown and a throne Standing at the manger and looking over the hills of hatred and suffering we can already see the great white throne from the wilderness of the temptation we can even catch a glimpse of the courage supper of the Lamb In the darkness around the cross we have visions of a great multitude which no man can number casting their crowns at the feet of the crucified Written large on all the life of Jesus there is in fact the witness that he will triumph we know and feel it it is revealed even when it is not stated it is assured even when not promised but I do not think that it is by virtue of this that Jesus Christ has exerted his great influence on the hearts of men to be a king to be in the royal line is a great thing to be the divine king is infinitely greater to be a king however is one thing to be a ruler is often quite another the right descent the royal birth the due recognition the ultimate taking possession of the throne are enough to make the king are from enough to make the ruler principles of course there are very important and far reaching involved in any sort of kingship we have all heard of the divine right of kings we all see even if we cannot understand it the love of peoples for a king even when the heads of state are called by some other name than king the fact of kingship is still there all this denotes the working of great principles having their roots in the deepest feelings of the human race but I repeat that to rule is quite another thing than to be a king history abounds with examples of great monarchs who have not ruled and of true rulers who have had no royal blood and no kingly throne and just as there are facts in human experience which have made kings necessary and possible so there are principles by which alone it is possible to rule the kingship and rule of Jesus Christ our lord was no exception it is not my purpose to dwell on the great and unchanging demands of the human soul which make his sovereignty a necessity of our well being alike as citizens as well as individuals of his world unless the lord is king all must be must be confusion dissonance and disaster the supreme fact in human life after all is that god is the creator preserver and governor of all things but what of his rule there another principle comes into operation on what is his rule based by what agency does he extend his authority until it becomes control and here it must be remembered that he aspires to rule men's hearts his kingdom is moral and spiritual first and then physical and material that is why it will endure forever it is in the region of motive and affection of reason and emotion of preference and choice that he designs to be ruler it is to reign in men's hearts that Christ laid aside his heavenly crown and throne if he cannot be ruler there then he will account little of his kingship in the skies by what then does he rule is it not by his compassion has that not been the chief influence which has drawn men to him and held them in his service just think for a moment of one or two commonplace facts one the children at least three fourths of the human family are always little children to what does he owe the influence he exercises in the minds and hearts of multitudes of these little ones his exalted throne his royal lineage his majesty no I think not to these but to the revelation of his pity his sympathy his patience his sweet forgiving grace his tender compassion as a savior to them he is the friend above all others the lowly one the gentle Jesus and mild viewing him thus they confess to him in sin they fly to him in sorrow his creative power his everlasting habitations his throne of unapproachable glory his glorious and terrible judgments are little more to the children than words and phrases may I not say at best but the trappings of his person they solemnize they inspire perhaps with reverent fear but they do not they could not secure that true ascendancy over the nature of the child by which alone there can be real control and true rulership rulership 2. the sorrowful sorrow is the most common of all human experiences there are no homes without it and there are very few hearts which have not tasted of its cup earth is a veil of tears sooner or later all men suffer man is born unto trouble as the sparks fly upward and to millions of men Christ has appeared in their affliction and taken possession of their lives what was the secret of his influence over them was it his dominion from sea to sea was it even his victory over death the conquest of the grave was it his sovereign throne of power no I do not think it was thus he won them but as the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief who learned obedience by the things that he suffered and who could compassionate with them in their sorrows also is one of the common places of life that people associated in great suffering and trials obtain great influence with each other and it is so here let the human heart once realize that in its deepest depths of sorrow it may have for helper one who has been deeper still the nature of things that it should fly to that one for sucker for sympathy for strength and when that one out of his riches gives his own might and of his own sweet unfathomed consolations then his government is assured his rule is established three the tempted did I say that sorrow was the commonest of all human experiences ought I not to have said temptation we all know the reality of temptation its biting wounds its power to assail to harass to irritate to worry senses the animal in us its assault on our confidence its liberty to terrorize and to torment yes every man is tempted how shall he withstand temptation what is it in Jesus Christ that calls the sorely tempted one to him is it his divine purity his kingly holiness his might as the supreme sovereign whose law is good no I think that only those who have learned to love him will love his law is it not rather the wonderful pity of him of whom it is written we have a great high priest touched with the feeling of our infirmities in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin touched with the feeling of our infirmities there is the attraction of a supreme compassion for the tempted there is the means by which the king of righteousness becomes also the ruler over tempted and sinful man I can add but one further word now if it is only by his continual compassion that our lord obtains and maintains his rule will it not be by a similar means that we may hope to bless and influence the souls of men yes and that has already been the great lesson of the salvation army it is founded on sympathy on a universal compassion the moment we turn away from that and rely merely on our system or on methods or our teaching we cease just a portion to be true salvationists we aspire to rule men's hearts we care nothing for the position of a church or sect we care everything for a real control over the souls and conduct of living men and women that we may lead them to God and use them for his glory it is by tenderness we shall win it by seeking them in their sorrows and sins by making them feel our true heart hunger over them our true love our entire union with the Christ in his compassion for them the same principle will hold good in the training of those whom we have already won this was, no doubt the secret of Paul's great influence with his people his whole heart was theirs and they knew it we were gentle among you he says even as a nurse cherisheth her children so being affectionately desirous of you we were willing to have imparted unto you not the gospel of God only but also our own souls because ye were dear unto us we know his courage his lofty standard his splendid impatience of shams his tenacity of the truth his contempt for danger his daring unto death and yet he can say of himself that with it all he was gentle among them as a nurse cherishing her children ready to give up his very soul for them ah colonel, captain, sergeant leaders all whatever name you bear do you want to lead some role the people whom God has given you as a charge then here is the true secret of power be forever pouring out your heart's deepest tenderest love for them and most of all for the weak and the most unworthy and sinful among them do this and you will not merely be walking after Paul you will be walking with Christ End of chapter 5