by Rev. John Macdonald, A.M., Calcutta
The following sketch was written in 1836 by the late Rev. John Macdonald, A.M., Calcutta, when he was minister of the Scots Church, Islington, London. It forms part of an introduction which this eminent and devoted minister, son of the distinguished Dr. Macdonald, of Ferintosh, “the Apostle of the North”, wrote to a small treatise entitled, “Christ in Believers the Hope of Glory”, being the substance of several sermons by the Rev. John Brown, of Wamphray, who lived during the times of persecution in Scotland and died in Holland in 1679. Mr Macdonald takes occasion in his introduction to this book to compare the ministry of his own time with that of a former age, and while we, at this date look back to the period at which he wrote as one fruitful in the full and powerful preaching of the Gospel, he, in reflection upon still more glorious times, expresses the fervent longings of his soul for the uprising of a race of Gospel ministers, men filled with the Spirit of Christ, who should take the place of a large number of preachers even in his own day, whose ministrations were dead and formal at the best. After some reference to the personal history of the Rev. John Brown of Wamphray, and the sermons of which he was the author, Mr Macdonald thus concludes this introductory sketch: —
“In Brown of Wamphray’s ministrations, we have not obtruded on our famishing souls that oily sentimentality, or that iced intellectualism, which so abound in this epicurean age of the Church — but we have the true bread, just as it has been gathered, wholesome and nutritious. Oh, that amidst the multitude of our popular and evangelical preachers and writers, we had but a phalanx of godly and spiritual men like him — men of heart — men of business — who would in right earnest negotiate between the Prince of Life and dying men, and not merely transact between a dead doctrine and a blind intellect; men who will not ever be substituting the vague idea of ‘Religion’ for the living person of the Son of God, or ‘Moral Influence’, for the personal operation of the Holy Ghost!”
In contemplating a past age, through such a work as this, and in contrasting our present character as a Church, with the worthies of that day, have we not much reason to be “stirred up to call upon the name of the Lord, yea, to take hold on him” as our covenant God, that He may come in and dwell with us, and in us, as our Hope of Glory? Have we not much reason to pour forth our hearts, saying ‘O the Hope of Israel, the Saviour therefore in the time of trouble! Why shouldest thou be as a stranger in the land, and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside but for a night to tarry? Why shouldest thou be as a man astonied, as a mighty man that cannot save? Yet thou, O Lord, art in the midst of us, and we are called by thy name; leave us not!
Oh do we not in these our days, need a race of men, full of strong and ardent love to the living and divine person of our Lord Jesus Christ, who can discern between the Master and His service, and love the latter for the sake of the former; men who can discriminate between the infirmities of the flesh and the image of Christ, so as to love that which is His, in spite of all that mars it?
Do we not need men of humility, contented to decrease, provided Christ increased; ready to live or die, to work or cease, to do or suffer, under Christ’s eye alone; not desiring notice or advancement from men; but thinking only for that ‘Saviour, which is better than life’, and wistfully catching that eye whose beam glisteneth upon us in secret and silent power?
Do we not amidst our multitude of covetous worldlings, and laborious earthworms in the Church, need a race of holy and heavenly-minded men, who shall pursue after holiness more than riches; and whose evident and supreme ambition shall be, perfect conformity to, and constant fellowship with Him, who sitteth in heavenly places, even the Son of God, who shall speak of heaven as those who do really thirst for it and who would even now prefer it to earth, were their Lord’s work but done and His purposes completed?
Need we not also a race of men, in whom Jesus of Nazareth may be evidently seen, dwelling by faith, as their sole and cherished hope, men who will breathe Christ, reflect Christ, diffuse Christ, savour of Christ, and glorify Christ; so that every work to which they set their hands, every gift they give, every sermon they preach, every prayer they offer, may be perfumed with the unction of His name; and so that the world might be compelled to say, ‘These men also have been with Jesus?’
Is there not need amongst us also of a band of self-denied men; who by reason of their living and indwelling Hope of Glory, would lay all things at the feet of Christ, and taking up their cross, would follow Him whithersoever He led them, in whom it would be seen, as in the days of Zion’s martyrs, that in their meekness, purity and zeal, they were living sacrifices, ready to be offered; who would stand bound by cords of love, which they would not loose, and cannot break, to the altar of Christ’s service; and whose only voice would be ‘Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven?’ O how would such confound the armies of the aliens!
Need we not men so filled with the Holy Spirit that He should become their very life; men full of joy without levity, full of peace without presumption, full of might without pride; men promoting the kingdom of Christ by their evident happiness, and strengthening their brethren by their constant hopefulness of mind; who should at all times so act, speak, and suffer, as they who are living temples of God the Holy Ghost, ever rejoicing in their hope, even when constrained to exchange Saul’s armour for David’s sling and pebble; men not blustering in their speech, not vaunting in their turn, but advancing in the silent consciousness of God dwelling within them? Oh for such men of God amongst us!
And lastly, do we not need an army of Christian men, who shall never think that they may sit at ease and rest them, that they may doff their armour, or hang up the Gospel trumpet in selfish silence, while hundreds of thousands in their own land, and hundreds of millions over the world, are trodden under foot of him who ‘was a murderer from the beginning’, and are daily burying in the pit of eternal death, ‘Without Hope?’ Jesus is our hope: by the Gospel has He become such to us; that Gospel of ‘Christ in us our hope’ we hold on trust also, for those who are perishing around our dwellings, and over the world: for ‘God would make known this mystery among the Gentiles’: and to us He hath committed the work of its publication.
Men and brethren, let us arise with Christ in our camp as the Hope of Glory: let us each one shake of our sleep of selfish ease: let us arise and take possession of our promised land which is not Judea, but the world. Oh when shall that day once come, when all Christians, in their every calling shall live for this, not as a subordinate, but as a primary end, that ‘every creature’ in Britain, and ‘every creature’ in Europe, Asia, Africa and America, and ‘every creature’ over the whole world may hear of the blessed mystery of ‘Christ in us the Hope of Glory!’
‘Awake, O north wind, and come thou south; blow upon our garden that the spices thereof may flow out!’ ‘Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord: awake as in ancient days, in the generations of old. Art not thou it that cut Rahab, and wounded the dragon? Art thou not it which hath dried the sea, the waters of the great deep; that made the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over?’ ‘Oh that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy presence!’ ‘Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain that they may live.’
Thou’rt fairer than all men;
Grace in thy lips doth flow;
And therefore blessings evermore
On thee doth God bestow.
Thy sword gird on thy thigh,
Thou that art most of might;
Appear in dreadful majesty,
And in thy glory bright!
Surely I come quickly; Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus’.”