Designed to assist the Labour of Missionaries and other
Instructors of the Ignorant.
BY THE LATE REV. JOHN LOVE, D.D.
(Continued from page 24.)
SECOND ADDRESS.
“GIVE ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. My doctrine shall drop as the rain; my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass. Because I will publish the name of the Lord; ascribe ye greatness unto our God.”
Listen, ye men and women of Otaheite. We have declared to you the name of the great God Jehovah. Never did a name so glorious, so awful, and so sweet, strike your ears. JEHOVAH! we tremble and rejoice while we pronounce it. Let your souls within your bodies tremble and rejoice. He thus spake from the clouds to one of the ancient fathers, “Jehovah, Jehovah, the strong God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty.” The ancient father who heard these words sounding with majesty in his ears “made haste, and bowed his head towards the earth, and worshipped.”
Inhabitants of Otaheite, you are our brethren and our sisters, we love you; our souls embrace your souls which dwell within your bodies; we earnestly long that your immortal spirits may be happy. We tell you the name of our God who makes our spirits happy, who gives us light and joy within. You say to us, Who is this Jehovah? where is He?
Hearken attentively, be quiet, do not laugh, do not turn about from us while we speak, do not talk to one another. We will declare that which, we are sure, is the truth. Our words will surprise you, they will give you joy.
You say to us, the people of Britain, Who is Jehovah? where is He? We say to you, Look up to these bright heavens over your heads, look down to this ground, to these hills, shores, trees, and beasts; look forth to that great ocean which gently murmurs all the day long on your shores; there was a time when these heavens, this earth, and that sea were not. Then there was a dead silence, a total darkness, a vast emptiness. Then our God was all around the silence, and the darkness, and empty void; He was also in the midst of them. And He said, “Let there be light, and there was light.” He said, “Let there be a wide spreading serene blue sky.” He said, “Come forth, thou sun, shine thou in these skies, and when thou goest far away let the moon ascend, and the stars sparkle in the heavens.” He said, “Let the waters spread forth; and let the earth rise up out of the waters, and let the herbs, trees, and flowers rise out of the earth.” He said, “Let there be fishes in the seas, and fowls in the air and on the branches of the trees, and let beasts walk and worms creep on the ground.” He said, “Let there be a man and a woman; let them behold the heavens and the earth; let the man and the woman stand upright looking to the skies; let them adore and love Me their Maker, let me love them and give them a multitude of children to fill the whole earth.” “He spake and it was; he commanded and it stood fast.” He who did these things is our God, Jehovah. “Have ye not known, have ye not heard of him, ye people of Otaheite? Hath it not been told you from the beginning? Have ye not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in.”
You say, Where is He? We do not see Him. We cannot find Him. Harken to our words, and consider well what we say. You breathe every moment—you cannot live without breathing the thin air. The thin air is round about you by day and by night, but you see it not, you cannot find it. Your souls are within your bodies, and when we look at you we perceive that your souls are there within your bodies; they are, as it were, looking at us through your eyes, yet we see not your souls. Our souls are here in our bodies; they loved you when we were far off in our own country, and we brought our bodies nearer and nearer to you. You see that we love you, and this makes us sometimes weep over you; yet you do not see our souls with your eyes, you see them with your minds. So Jehovah was near you, He was all round you like the thin air before we came to tell you of Him; He was loving you when you did not see Him, as we were loving you before you saw us or knew that we loved you.
Ye inhabitants of Otaheite, do you love to hear our words? Are you glad to hear us tell you of our God who made the heavens and the earth? You shall know Him; He will be as manifest before your minds as our faces are before your eyes. And when you thus know Him and see that He loves you, your hearts will leap within you for joy, and your shores, woods, and mountains will resound, “Praise Jehovah, the God of the people of Britain; let him love the people of Otaheite! Jehovah, he is the God! Jehovah, he is the God!”
THIRD ADDRESS.
ONCE more, inhabitants of Otaheite, we rejoice to behold your countenances, and to address you in the name of our God. We see your faces; we love those immortal spirits which dwell in your bodies. And we declare to you the infinite Spirit who is in every place, but nowhere to be seen by the eyes of the body. We bring you glad tidings of the love, kindness, and compassion of Jehovah, the glorious God.
Have you been sitting alone musing in your minds of this wonderful unseen God? You say to us, we look for Him with our minds, but we do not find Him. You say to us, show us a picture, an image, of your God.
Ah! we cannot make an image of our God. He is too great to be represented by any work of the little fingers of man.
Brethren and sisters, inhabitants of Otaheite, lift up your eyes to the bright, burning sun. He dazzles you; he strikes you blind with his splendour. Your eyes are feeble; they cannot look upon him. That bright sun which you cannot bear to look at is only a shadow—a dark shadow—of our God. The sun is not our God; he is but a candle held forth in the hand of our God to enlighten the earth. Look away from the sun. View the blue serene skies all wide spread out around him. These skies are beautiful; they are clear and shining; they are gracefully arched over the earth; they are vast and capacious: but they are not great enough, they are not beautiful enough, they are not sufficiently splendid, to represent the God whom we declare to you. Fair is the green earth; its blossoms are sweet, its fruits, its perfumes: but they are not sweet and fair enough to express the beauty and amiableness of our God. We have seen the vast ocean roaring and foaming to the skies, and seeming to open a thousand abysses to swallow us. It was terrible; but not so terrible as the anger of Jehovah against wicked men.
Still you say, how shall we know Him? show us His image.
Men and women of Otaheite, our God hath made an image of Himself in each one of you; not in your bodies without—though they are beautiful—but within you. Your immortal spirits are the image of God. Therefore honour these immortal spirits which are within you; be tenderly careful of them; cast them not away; tread not under your feet the image of God. Your spirits within you know and understand: God is full of understanding. Your spirits within you are kind and gentle: God is full of kindness and love. Your spirits within you are angry and frown upon you when you commit wickedness: God is full of purity. Your spirits are immortal: God is immortal.
You look into your spirits within you to see the image of our God, but still you cannot find Him; you find darkness.
Brethren and sisters, be not afraid; listen to our words. Our God is good and merciful. He will make you to know Him in your minds.
We told you that Jehovah created at the beginning one man and one woman. That man and that woman whom He created felt no inward darkness. That man and that woman saw God in His brightness, as you easily see the light and brightness of yonder sun. That man and that woman, seeing God in His brightness, felt sweetness and pleasure in their minds every hour all the day long. The earth also was fair and sweet around them; and there were many more trees, flowers, birds, and beasts—all beautiful—than are in this island. They loved God, and they loved each other. They did not fear death. They might have continued in joy and pleasure as many moons as there are little handfuls of water in the great sea. But that man and that woman became proud and unthankful, and would not obey Jehovah who made them happy; they would not continue in His light. He was angry and took away His light out of their souls. Then the man and the woman were afraid, and they tried to run away from God among the trees. But He was everywhere among the trees; they could not flee from Him. Jehovah spake to them; then they trembled greatly. They thought, now He will destroy us. But Jehovah said He would send another Man who would save them and many of their children.
Men and women of Otaheite, you are our brethren and sisters, our flesh and blood, and we bring to you the joyful news of that Man whom Jehovah promised to send into the world. That wonderful Man hath come into those parts of the world which are far off from Otaheite. He was the image of God. He was bright and glorious as the sun. When He walked up and down in the world, it was as if the sun had come down from the skies to the earth, not to scorch and burn it, but, shrouded in clouds, to cherish and delight it. But you were very far off, and many seas were between Him and you, and you could not see Him. When He spake and smiled, it was the voice of God and the sweet face of Jehovah. When He rebuked wicked men and frowned at them, they were struck with terror; they felt the anger of God. That Man commands us to tell you of Him, for He wishes to save you. Hereafter we will tell you His name, and many things concerning Him which will make your hearts glad.
Brethren and sisters, we advise you to go in a little while, each of you, to some place alone, on the shore or in the woods, and there sit down and think of these things which we declare to you. Then kneel upon the earth, and speak to Jehovah and say to Him, “Jehovah, God of the people of Britain, if thou art in the midst of this world, and art near me—if thou art the Maker of Otaheite—if thou art my Maker, O give me to know thee in my mind, and give me to know that Man whom thou hast sent to save the children of men.”
(To be Continued.)
The Assemblies.—The Assemblies of the Established, United Free, and Free Churches, met on Tuesday, 19th May. The Moderators are respectively Dr. Theodore Marshall; Dr. Laws, Livingstonia; and Rev. William Mackinnon, Gairloch. Some fuller references may be expected in next issue.