Our birthright as the dictionary tells us is, “That which belongs to one by virtue of his birth.” It is not his by any foresight or intellectual gifts above his fellows. It is not his by purchase or by any agreement. Our birthright, let us repeat again, is something that is ours by virtue of our birth. It may be riches, lands, privileges. The Bible speaks of birthright; and we have the well-known story of Esau selling his birthright to Jacob—selling it for something that did not equal in value the gift he so thoughtlessly gave away. His cry, though “great and exceeding bitter,” could not restore to him the birthright which he had despised—he found no place of repentance though his tears were bitter enough.
We too, as a people, have a great birthright. We were born in a land in which strenuous battles were fought, even to death, for the crown rights of Jesus Christ at the Reformation and the Second Reformation and again at the Disruption. Truly we may say that the lines fell to us in pleasant places and that the inheritance excelled in beauty. But alas! it holds true here, as in other things—easily got, soon forgotten. As a people, we began to despise our birthright, and then sold it for a trifle. It cost us nothing, but it was dearly bought and the least that might be expected of us is, that we would carefully guard against anything that would belittle it in the slightest degree. But there arose men in our midst who fought none of the battles for civil and religious liberty and did not hesitate to attack our noble Reformers. John Knox, particularly, was the target at which they aimed their shafts, until in the good providence of God, Dr. Thomas was raised up to give his countrymen a true picture of the man who delivered a crushing blow at the Church of Rome and became the Reformer of a kingdom. We entered into the labours of our Scottish Reformers and into those of Andrew Melville, Alexander Henderson, John Davidson (Prestonpans), Samuel Rutherford, and last but not least, the youthful, noble contender for the faith, George Gillespie. But others rose who were not in the battle and said hard things about the men who faced the enemy in our gates and handed down a precious heritage.
Again in 1893 a testimony was raised in the defence of the truth.
To be born in a godly home, where we are surrounded by a religious atmosphere, is a precious birthright. And while it requires a great deal more than this, ere we become true followers of Jesus Christ, yet who will deny that it is an inestimable blessing to be born into such a home, rather than in one where irreligion and maybe open hostility to all that is honouring to God prevails. Surely it is a boon not to be despised, that during our young years, when our vagrant thoughts would drive us where we know not, that we should be under the restraint of a godly discipline. Yet here again, we must be reminded, useful though this is, we need a power greater than man possesses to lead us into the new and living way.
Again, to be brought up in a church where the truth of God is preached faithfully and His Word read, is surely a blessing not to be lightly esteemed. When we look around us and think of the kind of teaching that is given in so many churches around us, should we not be thankful to know that we belong to a denomination which, with all its faults, adheres to the preaching of the great fundamental doctrines of Ruin by the Fall, Redemption by Christ, and Regeneration by the Holy Ghost. Think what it would mean if we had been born in the R.C. Church or in a denomination where modernism with all its soul-destroying teaching is proclaimed. Is it wise, to say the least of it, to despise such a blessing and cut our connection with it for the most trivial reasons?