But for Calvary we could never have had it; but for the Cross we should not know what it means. The Cross of Christ in our experience become the dynamic of missionary endeavour.

I was once in a company where a minister was speaking about what he called the New, or Social, Gospel. Well, I believed him. Quite true, we need it; we are to blame for not preaching it sooner. But he said it was the whole Gospel; he said, "I believe that our Lord is well pleased by those who offer Him little or no devoutness, who are not sure about the claims of the Christ, and especially the dogma of the Atonement, but who are serving to the best of their ability their brother men." I felt it was superficial, though the whole room was against me; and I felt it because I think our friend began at the wrong end. Philanthropy itself is a feeble, pulseless thing unless it has been born of the Cross, and the indirect effects of the evangel of the Cross are responsible for most of the so-called philanthropic endeavour of the day, against which I would not speak one word of contempt, but which sees no need of an evangel to preach. No, no. The brotherhood which is worthy of the name, the evangelic impulse which alone can save humanity, begins in the fellowship of the cleansing. We have vision of the Holy; we have repentance toward God; we have the assurance of sin forgiven; we have the inflow of the Spirit; we have that new relationship, which the world can neither give nor take away, with Him who agonised upon Calvary; and, with that in our hearts, with that motive in our minds, with that strength in our endeavours, we go forth in confidence. Missionary or preacher was never made in any other way. We speak to the deep

things in mankind when we have first been to the side of the Christ. It was this that made John Wesley say, "The whole world is my parish." It was this that compelled St. Francis Xavier to the urgent missionary utterance, as, with arms outstretched, he sailed for India, “More sufferings, more sufferings, Lord!" It was this that came to the Moravian who cried to his countrymen :

"I hear a voice you cannot hear,

Which bids me not to stay;

I see a hand you cannot see,
Which beckons me away."

If there were no humanity to save, none but our own, yours and mine, the fellowship of the cleansing would still be ours; but we would be seeking for something to do to express to the Christ our sense of what that fellowship had brought.

Two sisters brought this fact home to me within a few hours of the time in which I heard the minister whom I have just quoted speak. One was weak, suffering, dying, though the other did not know it at the time. The one who was watching by the bedside said, “It seems dreadful to be so helpless, to feel I can do so little to assuage the suffering of the dear one. I can do nothing whatever. If I only could do something, that hurts, hurts me, I think I should feel better, to let my love out." I know what she meant quite well-to let the love out. The love that we bear the dear Redeemer compels us to see the Divine in mankind. There is a sweet and holy sympathy born of that urgent desire to let the love out which was born in the fellowship of the cleansing. The love of Christ constrains.

us.

Brethren, the last word I would leave with you is this: Consider little about ways and means; consider little about faulty methods; consider much whether we do not need once more vision of God in the face of Him whose visage was marred more than the face of any man; and whether we do not need a renewal of that holy fellowship which begins at Calvary. May we feel as the Apostle of old felt and said-Paul, the aged-" For me to live is Christ-is Christ." If so, when the Master's call comes, as to the consecrated heart it always comes, we shall say with that prophet of old, "Here am I; send me."

XXII

THE PROPHET IN PRAYER *

I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.—Gen. xxxii. 26. God forbid that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you.—1 Sam. xii. 23.

M

WAY I venture to speak principally to my brother ministers, and not as a censor, but as a brother, from the subject of the Prophet in Prayer? In these two striking passages, the utterance of patriarch and prophet, we have a source of inspiration, a mark for our guidance, and a subject for heart-searching. Here are two strongly contrasted crises of spiritual experience, the experience of the servant of God in all time. Let us compare them a little more closely.

In the first the patriarch Jacob is before us, an erring, sinning, suffering man. He has been for a generation an exile from his father's house, dwelling amongst strangers. He is the possessor of a heritage obtained by fraud, and it has profited him nothing. As George Eliot says, "It was not worth doing wrong for; nothing ever is in this world." After the lapse of so many years, one might have thought that his sin was expiated, and the very memory of it wiped out. We have no record of the way in which it affected him

Preached to the National Council of Evangelical Free Churches, in the Dome, Brighton, on Tuesday evening, March 10, 1903.

self, it is not recalled in the pages of the book in which we have read. Great changes have taken place since the sin was committed. Jacob is no longer alone. With his staff he passed over Jordan; now he has become two bands. He is returning to the land of his fathers, but right across his path comes a reminder of the day of his guilt. The shadow of retribution is over him; Esau, his brother, from whom he has nothing to expect but vengeance, is coming to meet him with a strength greater than his own. Then the memory of the past awakens in the breast of this man, and not for himself only is he anxious now. He could bear the worst that his brother could inflict, were it not that he is father and master, he has a household to think of; not to himself does he stand or fall, but if he be punished some should be smitten whom he holds dearer than his own life. He tries every means to propitiate his brother. He has but little hope of succeeding, so he falls to praying. Alone he wrestles till the breaking of the day. But in that dark vigil Esau was vanquished before the meeting took place; the sinner became triumphant; he had saved not only himself, but those he prayed for when he prayed for himself, for true penitence, let me say, always contains an intercessory element. If a man prays for forgiveness for himself alone, and if selfishness be the most prominent feature in his prayer, his penitence is false. Jacob wrestled till the breaking of the day with breaking heart because of his dread for his own. He was thinking of the wife and the little ones behind him, and that was the reason he was so urgent, and beat against the breast of God, saying, "I will not let Thee go, except Thou bless me." And