Setting The Right Example

    In Phil. 3:17, I read, "Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an ensample." In 1 Thess. 1:6, 7. "And ye became followers of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost: so that ye were ensamples to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia." In 1 Cor. 11:1, "Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ."' And in Phil. 4:9, "Those things which ye have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do: and the God of peace shall be with you."

These four texts introduce the subject that I feel the Lord will be pleased to have me present to you.

PLACE AND MISSION OF THE CHURCH

We are saved, my brethren and sisters, not merely to escape hell and gain heaven, but to fill the place and perform the work that God has assigned us. Many people have no higher ideas, and it seems that their comprehension of a Christian life and experience reaches no farther, than simply that God has saved them that they may escape the punishment and damnation of hell, and to be so unspeakably happy as at last to gain and enjoy the bliss of heaven through an endless eternity. It is true that, when we are saved from sin, we are saved from hell; we are saved from that punishment that really was due us and that we justly merited because of our rebellion against the law of God. I am glad to say that every one who is a possessor of salvation is not only saved from his past life of sin, not only saved from what might have happened in the future of his life here should he have continued in sin, but, thank God, saved from the punishment of an unending hell. Salvation comprehends that, and moreover, it grants you heaven and all its glory. But there is more in it than this. We have a mission to fulfill. I pray God to lay the responsibility of that mission upon our hearts and to help us to fulfill it, realizing that we are traveling to the judgment and are soon to meet a just God, who will require of us that which is committed into our charge. What, then, is our mission?

EXHIBITING THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST

When saved, we are to exhibit his holiness, purity, and righteousness before the eyes of all with whom we come in contact. That is what we are here for. Jesus Christ is not here in person, but his church represents him in the world, and is intended to be a medium through which he can disseminate light and truth and salvation to the darkened hearts of men and women. When people behold our lives, they should see Jesus. That is what Paul meant when he said, "For me to live is Christ; and to die is gain." There needs to be less of self and more of the Christ-life. More "Christ within" and more Christ "put on." "Christ in you the hope of glory." We need to be filled with the spirit, love, and power of Jesus Christ every day we live. Thus we shall scatter smiles and sunshine all along life's pathway.

ATTRACTING MEN TO CHRIST

O brothers and sisters, are you living so that you may attract men to Christ? Jesus said, "Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven." What a responsible position! and yet, brother, sister, that is our place in the world. As people see the life of Christ demonstrated in us, they will be won to him. They will see the Christ-life in us, and it will make them hungry to attain to the higher and better life. There is as much difference between the life of the holy and pure and those who live in sin as there is between heaven and hell.

A GAZING-STOCK

Some people, when they get saved, remark, "I wish people would not watch me so closely." That is what you are saved for. When you get saved and step out before the world, you are like the man who goes to the fair with his products and puts them on exhibition. He doesn't take the poorest products, but puts on exhibition the very best. And if his potatoes take the premium, people say to each other, "Let us get some of those," and ask such questions as, "What variety is this?" "How many did you raise to the acre?" They want some for seed. The manufacturer who takes his sewing-machine or his reaper or whatever the product of his factory may be, puts on exhibition the very best he has. The machine that does the best work and takes first premium will attract people's attention. Wives will say to their husbands, "Did you notice such and such a machine? It took the premium. Say, when we get a machine let us get that kind." We are like the sewing-machine or the reaper on exhibition. God has put us before the world on exhibition. People come and look. They have a right to examine our lives and to scrutinize them very closely, very minutely. The Bible says that we are a gazing-stock. As people look at us, they see Jesus. They see something better than this old world of sin offers, and so they say, "If ever I get religion, I want his kind." Oh say, there is a reality in this. I pray God to help us as individuals and as the collective body of the church of God in the world to feel more keenly this responsible position in which God has placed us. Let us do our very best, by the help and grace of God, to exhibit publicly that pure life of Christ, so that men may be attracted to him. "Ye are the epistles of Christ, known and read of all men."

People, generally speaking, do not read their Bibles. Go to the homes of the people, and you will find a thousand newspapers to one Bible. While reading on the cars, how many people have you seen reading their Bibles? People read the papers, but not the Bible. Do not understand me, that I discourage reading newspapers. But if people read the Bible half as much as they do the papers, they would be better acquainted with it. To worldly people the Bible is a dry book. They are not interested in it. But there is one thing they do read, and that is your life. That is one thing everybody reads. Says one," I thought I lived to myself." No man lives to himself. The eyes of the world are turned upon you. You are a gazing-stock, "a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men." You are to step out before the world, so that when they read your life, they read the Bible - the Word of God. If they will not read the written Word, they will read it in you. They can read the living epistle, the life of Jesus Christ and the truth of the Bible before their very eyes. And the people expect to do that.

In the sectarian realm of dead, formal worship, men can do many things that are wrong, and people think nothing about it. Sectarians can get angry, fight, lie, swear, and quarrel at home with their wives, and so forth, and little attention is given to it. They can chew, smoke, and dress like the world, and nothing is thought about it. Bet let one of God's saints deviate one iota from the plain path of divine truth, and it creates a general stir. People will say, "Did you hear what John Jones did?" Why do they expect so much more of us? Because we profess a higher life. Oh that God will make us feel the responsibility of living a Christian life! Demonstrate before the world the life and character of Jesus, so that as they see our life, they will read the Bible just as it is. I wonder how many of us have been converted and led to Christ as the result of the godly life of others.

ADORNING THE DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

I heard the present truth a good many years before I fully accepted and embraced it. There were a few folks in our community that did embrace it. Their lives were such that they convinced me there was something in it. When a preacher came around to preach it, what made it beautiful to me was to see men that lived it out before my eyes - the very truth he preached. They confirmed the truth; they beautified the gospel to me. As a result of their lives, my heart was won to Christ. I remember that when I was a young man, I said, "If ever I get religion, I want their kind." I carried that conviction in my heart until I got ready to surrender myself to God.

Paul says, "Adorn the doctrine of God our Savior." We sometimes sing, "Are you adorning the doctrine?" Do you know what that means? Do you know what is comprehended in that Bible truth? How do we do that? By our experience and life. To the general class of men in the world, there is very little in the Bible of interest. You can hardly attract their attention to it, for their minds are filled with so many other things. Do you know what will make the truth of that book beautiful and attractive? Our having the experience it teaches, and living the truth of it right out before them. In a series of meetings held in Nebraska (by Brother Speck, I believe) two men came to the altar one kneeling at one end of the bench and the other at the farther end. Both confessed that they had a very humiliating duty to perform. Finally each promised to do all that God required, and both were gloriously converted. The next morning one hunted up a stolen ax and started for his neighbor's house. When he was about half way, he met his neighbor with a log-chain. They exchanged greetings, both praising God that they had found Christ. Then the one began in shame to confess that he had stolen his neighbor's ax, and the other confessed that he had stolen his neighbor's log-chain. They asked each others forgiveness, exchanged goods in the middle of the road, and each took his own tool home. Don't you think that when those brothers afterwards met in meeting, they had confidence in each other? That is adorning the doctrine of restitution.

About twenty years ago, while I was conducting a series of meetings in Indiana Co. Pa., an old gray-haired man came to the altar. It seemed he could not find God. As we talked to him, he finally said, "Wife and I raised a big family of children, and in our old days we got to quarreling and fighting, and as a result separated. She has one farm and I have another." They had lived apart for about ten years. I said, "I tell you, Father R--, you need to go and get reconciled to your wife." "No, sir," he replied, "she was to blame. Mean woman, I couldn't live with her." I said, "The idea of you and that woman living together and raising a family of children, and now in your old days separating. You go and be reconciled to that wife of yours." Finally he said he would. The next night the house was filled with people, and the altar was filled with seekers. As we pressed the invitation, I saw an old man coming down the aisle and an old lady following after him. They knelt down side by side at the altar. It was this man and his wife. Soon they were both weeping, each crying out, "I am to blame!" "I am to blame!" "O God, forgive!" As they confessed their sins, God gloriously saved them. It was a happy reconciliation, and they lived together a number of years after that. Many happy seasons did my wife and I spend in their home. Their home was truly a happy one. They both died in the faith. That is what beautifies the doctrine.

When we preach the gospel of sanctification, do you know what will adorn that doctrine? For men and women to get a Bible experience of sanctification and live the life before the world. In Leechburg, Pa., was a desperate, wicked man, but he was converted. He was bold in meetings to testify that he was sanctified. One day a wicked man struck him a hard blow on the one side of his face without cause. The brother turned the other cheek, and said, "You may strike that, too." The man fell down and said, "O Mr. K--! I have committed an awful sin. Will you forgive me? I have struck a holy man." That is adorning the doctrine.

There are some fellows claiming to be saved and sanctified, who, when you cross them, are like a cat when you brush its hair the wrong way; they are ready for fight. O brethren, there is nothing like that in you when you are sanctified. There is peace. That old nature is gone. There is no room for jealousy, envy, evil surmisings, hatred, pride and retaliation. The love of God is shed abroad in your heart. You will love your worst enemies with a sweet, tender affection. You will be able to manifest it in your looks and in your tone of voice. There are some people who can look daggers at you. Sanctified people will look as sweet and their tone of voice can be as calm under pressure as at any other time. That is adorning the doctrine.

RIGHT EXAMPLE AS TO UNITY

When we preach and profess unity, let us show it in our lives. I will say, God being my witness this afternoon, that before I will lower the standard of the Bible unity, this head shall be severed from my body. Brethren, let us stand for the unity of the Bible. Let us stand against division of every kind and live in the bonds of peace, so that, with the primitive church, we shall all be of one heart and soul, and present to the world a blood-washed army of soldiers of the cross. Adorn the doctrine of unity. The apostles "were all of one accord in one place," and "the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul." That blessed demonstration of unity in the primitive church convinced the world and also resulted in the manifestation of the power of God. God help us to demonstrate it before the world. Stand for the unity that belongs to the church of God universally. That doesn't mean that the saints of one or two states should get together, nor that two or three or a dozen preachers should have a little unity of their own. It means that we are to be in unity with the body entire. You will find me with the body entire. I am a member of that, as well as of the assembly where I live. "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one for another."

THE IMPORTANCE OF RIGHT LIVING

"Those things which ye have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do." "Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ." The duty of every man and woman in the church is to live right. I want to impress upon you the importance of right living; first, in the home; secondly, in the church; and thirdly, before the world at large. I want you to listen attentively. Do not receive this merely as the word of man, but as the word of God. I am only God's messenger and a very unworthy messenger at that.

IN THE HOME

The Apostle Paul said, "Show piety at home." The first place to demonstrate that you are a Christian is in your home. People who do not live right at home are not fit to profess abroad. Many people come to camp meeting and when the rich blessings fall, wonder why they do not get their share? Their troubles at home hinder. Husbands should be examples to their wives, and wives should be examples to their husbands. You, of course, have human weaknesses and difficulties to overcome; but when it comes to the main principles in life, you can live right. You can command the confidence and the respect of your wife or your husband. Sometimes a husband will say to the preachers that have come into his neighborhood, "I wish you brethren would go to my home and talk to my wife. I should be so much rejoiced if she would get saved. Will you go home with me?"' The ministers comply with his request. The next morning one of them says to the wife, " Would you not like to be a Christian? Have you been attending our meetings?" She answers, "I have attended some of them." "How does the truth impress you?" "All right." "Then, why do you not come along with your husband and serve the Lord together?" "My husband!" she exclaims, "You get him right, and I will feel more like it." "What is the matter with him?" "If you were around some morning at six o'clock, you would know how mean he is." There are some wives of the same kind. They ask the preacher to go home and talk to their husbands. Ah! in many a case the husband has no confidence in his wife's profession. She is a contentious woman. It is not that way when you get saved. God wants men and women to live right at home - the husband to live so before his wife that he will command her confidence, and the wife to live likewise before her husband.

Are you forbearing? The Bible says to forbear one another in love. Perhaps you and your wife are not exactly of like disposition. Have you learned to forbear? Let me give a bit of advice to young married people; it will do the older ones good, too. Study each other's natural dispositions and makeup, then forbear one another in love. If you are both positive in your makeup, what do you do? Do you get tried over each other and contend for your own way? You will have trouble between you if you get too positive. I am positive and have a positive wife. Tow positives must learn some things. We have learned to forbear and to submit to each other. That is the way for you to do it. If you do not, there will be trouble. "Forbear one another in love."

That is a good thing to do in the church. We are not all of the same temperament. There are brethren whose temperaments are such that they simply flow together. Do you remember Peter, James and John? There was something about these three that caused Jesus to select them to go with him to the mountain and other places where the other nine were not permitted to go. Did the others get jealous and quarrel over this? There is no record of such actions. If there is somebody in the church that is not of the same temperament as you, forbear in love and do not bring in division and lack of confidence. There is something here to be learned. Two brethren work hard; one is slow and particular, the other fast and not very particular. They will inevitably have trials over each other. They must forbear in love. Once when I intended to hold a meeting at a certain place, I sent the tabernacle ahead. The brother I sent it to was one of those easy-going fellows. When I arrived, he had nothing ready for the meeting. I said to him, "You must get something ready for the meeting tonight; get the seats, etc." He said, "A-l-l r-i-g-h-t"; but it was hard to get him to stir. What I have to do, I do with all my might. If ever a man was a trial to me, he was. The devil suggested that if he had salvation he would not be so slow.

FORBEARANCE AND SUBMISSION

The Bible tells us to forbear one another in love; to suffer long and be kind. Some people can suffer a long time, but the thing is to be kind. In the church and in the home, people need to forbear one another; to be long-suffering, kind, and submissive. Suppose you make a mistake. Are you willing to correct it? Some men are too proud and stubborn to ask their wives' forgiveness. They think that would be below the dignity of their position. They say by their actions, if not in words, "My wife belongs down at my feet." If she had belonged at your feet, God would have taken the bone out of the foot. God was wise when he made the woman. He took a rib out of the side, and she belongs right at man's side. Wife, you do not belong at the head, either. The bone was not taken from the skull. You belong at his side. That is where everyone belongs - side by side. Every man should love his wife and give her a place at his side. Correct your mistakes.