Christian's Duty to Work for Saving of Souls

THE DUTY OF CHRISTIANS TO LABOR FOR THE SALVATION OF SOULS.
BY REV. J. S. BINGHAM.
BOSTON: NICHOLS AND NOYES. 1866.Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by NICHOLS AND NO YES, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. CAMBRIDGE: STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SONS.
Number 11. Published by direction of the Congregational Churches of Boston.
IT will be taken for granted in the work now in hand, that souls still in the bondage of sin need to be saved. We shall assume, that, if Jesus came to seek and save the lost, there were lost to be sought and saved. We are not to attempt to prove the urgency of a work which has no existence. Souls which have not been renewed by the regenerating power of the grace of God are in a state of condemnation and death, and must be rescued; or that condition will prove an eternal one. We shall assume the importance of the work on earth, from the nature of the case, and the teachings of Christ. The only point now before us is, On whom is the responsibility devolved of laboring to secure the result? Here is a work to be done: who is to do it? Is the duty resting on a set-apart and ordained few, or on the redeemed and consecrated many? We believe every Christian to be under the highest obligations to labor for the rescue of those still unsaved. With these assumptions and qualifications, we may, perhaps, with profit, consider some reasons, why it is the duty of Christians to labor for the salvation of souls.
1. And we shall discover the first reason in the fact, that the Christian has struck the same law of action that actuates the Divine mind, which law is: what can be wisely done for the salvation of souls ought to be done.
So deep is the love of God, so pure is His compassion, and so determined His opposition to sin, that truthfulness to His own nature requires Him to do all He can wisely do to arrest its progress; and save those who have thrown themselves into its power, and subjected themselves to its fearful results. For “sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death, " death to manhood, death to human affection, death to sonship with God, and all its present and eternal rewards and privileges. It did not seem right to the Divine mind to allow the sinner to remain in this state of moral and spiritual ruin into which he had voluntarily plunged himself. Not that the law was unholy or unreasonable; not that the retributions for its breach were not ordained in infinite wisdom, love, and righteousness; but that, if any thing could be done in harmony with the eternal principles of Divine economy in moral and spiritual relations, it ought to be done. God could not be true to Himself, true to His own ideas of redemption, which ideas are as fundamental as those of the creation of moral beings, and leave the sinner to perish without His intervention, Sis working to save him. Hence Jesus “was slain, from the foundation of the world." This could be done. The law could not be changed; its retributions could not be annulled, for these were in their nature immutable; but Jesus could come and receive the consequences of the sinner's guilt upon His own heart, and send back a current of life from that heart to regenerate and redeem the sinner. This He could do, and not move a single line in the infinite survey of Divine economy. And because He could do it, He was impelled by the law of dutifulness to Himself to say, “Lo! I come." Hence He says, " Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory? ' as much as to say, It was needful for Christ to endure what He has for the sinner, in order to unfold the true glory of the Divine nature, and -satisfy its yearning love.
But the Christian, by virtue of his regeneration and consecration, has received the same spirit, and become permeated with the same ideas and principles. The same mind which was in Christ is in him. The same law of action, the same law of sacrifice, moves him. If Jesus felt that truthfulness to the Divine nature in Him required Him to do what He has done to save the sinner; if, in this sense, He felt He must do what could and, therefore, ought to be done, the same spirit and principle will actuate and energize the Christian, every Christian. If Christ came to seek and to save the lost, because He was constrained by the yearning of His own eternal love, the same love must and will constrain His disciple.
Here then is the foundation of Christian duty in this regard. It rests on this principle: it is not right, is not consistent with the nature and character of " our Father ' to permit the sinner to live and perish in his sins without doing all that can be wisely done for his redemption. We say wisely, because it is manifest that what cannot be wisely done, in moral relations, cannot be done at all. This is the ground of God's action. It must be the ground of duty for the Christian. He cannot be true to God; true to his own nature, now renewed, and sanctified; true to the needs of his fellow-men, without going to the extreme boundary of his capacity in laboring for the salvation of souls. This, if we mistake not, is the highest idea of duty. It fuses sympathy and love with unchangeable righteousness. It declares, it is not right to permit our neighbor to commit moral suicide. It is not right to allow our children to perish in the flames, although they are very wicked children; and have disobeyed our kind, but positive, instructions, and set the house on fire over their heads. It demands of us to rush into the flames, and pluck men as brands from the burning. It charges us to hedge up the ruinous way of the sinner with every possible means of grace, with Bibles and sermons, with expostulations and arguments, with entreaties and prayers, with floods of tears, and the gushing blood of agony, if so be he may be arrested in his mad career of death, and turned back into the wav of holiness and life. It bids us plead, "Father, forgive them: they know not what they do." It bids us stand between the living and the dead, and stay the sweeping malady. If men are so far gone as to be utterly indifferent to the claims of God, and completely reckless in regard to their own eternal interests, we must be all the more in earnest. Out into the highways and hedges of the country, the streets and lanes of the city, must we urge our way; and compel the most thoughtless to think, the most hardened to feel, and the most stubborn to yield. As God did not wait for perishing sinners to apply for His redemption in saving grace, so Christians must not wait for awakened sinners to ask to be guided to the fountain of salvation. We must go, unasked; we must persevere, although resisted. We have thrown ourselves into the current of infinite love, demanding, as a duty, the utmost that can be done to save the sinner. And this principle presses upon, and springs up within, every Christian, without exception. It conquers all reluctance and timidity, all reserve and natural frigidness. It bursts forth, like a blazing Hecla, amid gathering icebergs and snow-capped mountains. So deep and mighty is the vital force, so perfectly is the life united to, and “hidden with, Christ in God," that it must have utterance. It is a law of duty springing from the heart, as well as the wisdom, of God; inspiring every heart which has ever felt the regenerating power of saving grace.
2 But we may see another reason for this in the fact, that Christians are now the body of Christ on earth.
"While Jesus our Lord was here in person," He possessed a body in which he went about doing good." In this, He manifested God in the flesh. In this, He glorified, unfolded, brought out to view, the nature and thoughts of God. In this, He developed the power of Divinity working through the agency of humanity, a Divine soul revealing itself as united with, and exercising complete control over, a human soul and body. But that soul, and that body spiritualized, Christ has taken with Him to heaven. In the place of this humanity, in the place of this human soul and body, He has placed His believers. Every Christian is now the humanity, the body, the objectiveness, the manifestation of Christ in the flesh, in the place where in the providence of God he may be located. Christians are now His willing feet, His outstretched hands, His persuasive lips, His tremulous voice, His weeping eyes. His yearning, redeeming, agonizing love is now to be manifested through the life and preaching and prayers of His disciples. His Spirit uses Philip as His earthly humanity to guide the inquiring eunuch to the Saviour he sought; He uses Peter as His body at Jerusalem and Cesar ea; Paul, at Damascus, Ephesus, Athens, and Rome; and His disciples, everywhere " scattered abroad," " preaching the word." His Spirit enters into His disciples, and inspires them as preachers, writers, publishers, teachers, and laborers in every department of work for the relief of human woe, and the salvation of ruined souls. In His name, in His power, and in His stead, they go forth; and, if they abide in Him, whatsoever they shall ask shall be done for them. If His Spirit strives within them in “groanings which cannot be uttered," how speedily will He answer them!
If then Christians are faithful, and really consecrated to their work, His work, Christ will have as many souls and bodies, through which to seek the lost, as there are believers in Him. This has been adopted as the best and closing dispensation in God's kingdom on earth. It has seemed best thus to blend Divinity with human thought, sympathy, love, and faith, in the work of saving souls. It was expedient for Christ in person to go away in order that the Holy Ghost, whom He would send in his name, might be conferred upon the whole Church; and the gospel be more universally preached to every creature. For as, in the physical world God can most wisely erect temples, construct ships, and build railroads through the agency of the skill and workmanship of man, while He carves out the continents and lifts up the mountains without such agency; so can He, in the spiritual world, best redeem and save sinners through the cooperation of those already rescued. Having chosen this plan as the best, as His choosing it proves, the duty is imperative upon every one who has been reached and quickened by the power of God, most earnestly and faithfully to manifest His love in every appointed way. If Christians are true temples of the Holy Ghost; if He abides with them continually, and is ever struggling in their souls to be uttered; if He strives to make the humanity in which He lives speak His words, obey His guidance, and breathe His petitions; if God is stretching out His hands of compassion to the perishing through those who have covenanted with Him, as much as in them lies, to represent and make effectual His unceasing love and pardoning grace, can there be any question respecting duty? If Christians are to be so many editions of the life of Christ; so many living commentaries on His teachings; so many illustrations of the meaning of " regeneration, sanctincation, and redemption; " so many wills, repeating all along the whole line of humanity, the commands, the warnings, and the invitations of God, is there still any ground for debate concerning duty? There is no avoiding the obligation save in renouncing allegiance to God, separating ourselves from Christ, and refusing to be the temples of the Holy Ghost. If we are not laboring for the salvation of souls, we are not the body of Christ, and we do not bear the fruit of His heart. We are only nominal branches; and must, sooner or later, be removed.
3. We shall discover another reason for this duty in the peculiar efficiency of its earnest discharge.
If God has made any thing clear in these days, it is the amazing power of the people. The idea of the Divine right of a few to govern the many is exploded. The governing and redeeming power of the people is most signally owned of God as His own appointment. When He has secured in the hearts of the people " a mind to work," His great designs of human salvation and elevation are rapidly achieved. When this marvellous latent energy can be aroused, quickened, and brought out into wise and earnest work, the most glorious results are witnessed. We see this in times of revival. Christians as a body are then at work, as they ought to be all the time, " every one over against his own house," and in his place of business, with his neighbors, in the "people's meeting" for conference and prayer. The masses of impenitent persons are moved because the Spirit of God in the masses of Christians has utterance. Many souls are saved because many are working and praying to that end. It is not the minister and a few " leading members ' only who are now at work manifesting the love of Christ, but the democratic element of power is now in active operation. The constitution of the human heart is the same as before; the truth is the same; God is the same; His readiness to hear and answer prayer, and reward labor, is only the same: but the people are changed. They are now personally laboring directly to save souls; and so long as they continue in that work will the revival continue, whether it be for weeks, months, or years. There will be greater manifestations of the Spirit's presence at some times than at others, but the real work will go on continually.
It is the perpetual, personal labor of every Christian which occasions the leaven rapidly to leaven the whole lump. The leavened works on that portion of the unleavened with which it conies in contact. Christians are scattered through the whole community, in which the gospel has attained a good measure of success; and the Spirit of God has thus a humanity, through which to work in every department of society.
Sinners will cavil over the Bible, give away preaching, and question the printed page; but the consistent, earnest, warm-hearted Christian, who personally cares for their souls, gains access to the heart, and leads them into the kingdom of God. Bibles and well-selected libraries are priceless treasures on shipboard, but a skilful, resolute, courageous, Christian sailor, who lives and talks the Bible, and converses with his shipmates concerning the eternal interests of their souls, will accomplish more than they all. What then shall we say concerning his duty? What shall we say of the duty of every Christian who has any mode of personal access to men? What shall we say of the duty of Christians scattered abroad, and daily coming in contact with those who never visit the sanctuary, or come within the reach of any other means of grace? The press and the pulpit can do much, but the working people can do immeasurably more. They can make every house and work-shop, every market-place and highway, a place of " speaking for Jesus." Instead of leaving their avocations because they are converted, they make the fact, that men must meet them on business in these avocations, an occasion for doing something for the salvation o their souls. Men are shy of those who make it their profession to save souls, but feel at home with their daily associates; and a few words from these will often have more power over them than the most elaborate sermons.
And men are never too much in a hurry to speak or hear a word in this direction, if that is made the engrossing topic. When we were struggling to save the nation, we were never too much in haste to say, "Good news to-day; ' "Glorious victory, that!' "God is helping us." So when Christians make the salvation of souls the great business of life, and all transactions in the things needful for the body only its incidentals, they always will find time to say, "Come to Jesus;" "I hope you love the Saviour." If Christians will surrender themselves to be used by the Spirit of God, and permit Christ to speak through them at all times and in all places, we shall see the kingdom of God coming with power and glory. If every individual Christian will reduce this, his chief business, to system, throwing his inventive power into it to discover the best means he can use; if he will throw his entire human force, sanctified and permeated by the Divine, into this work, the will of God will soon be done on earth as in heaven. Should every Christian, like a man of business, carry his pocket-memorandum with its list of " persons to be seen; ' " individuals to be conversed with today; “subjects for this week's prayers; " " cases of conversion ascertained; ' " urgent, present demands; ' " persons not to be unduly urged;' there can be no estimate of the results. There can be no more question of success in this matter than in any other in which men rightly and earnestly engage. God has determined to bless persevering work; He always has crowned it; He will He does, now. It is in harmony with His own action, and the laws of the human mind. It imparts life and vigor to the laborer. It intensifies his consecration, and hastens his sanctification. It gives directness in effort, and peculiar power and prevalence in prayer. He has an object in his will, a burden upon his heart, and a glorious result in his faith. He has struck the idea of Jesus, when He pleads, " I pray not that Thou shouldst take them out of the world." There is work to be done; souls to be saved; Divine love to be carried to the perishing; Christ's work on earth to be perpetuated, and advanced to complete triumph through human forces. With every Christian thus laboring, praying, and trusting in God, there is no more doubt, that every Christian Church in the world can double its numbers each successive year, than there can be doubt in the promises and faithfulness of God. This is bringing in " all the tithes," this is doing all we know how to do; and the windows of heaven will surely be opened over us, and a blessing poured out which there shall not be room to receive. Is there then any question of duty? We, the people, possess the most effective power through which the Holy Spirit can bring the truth to bear upon the heart of unregenerate men. We possess human sympathy, and human experience, the experience of being once lost, but now found; once wrecked, but now rescued; once " starving prisoners," but now at home, amid its peace and plenty and unspeakable joy. And shall we forget the lost, still wandering; the wrecked, still tossing amid the breakers; the prisoners, still starving? Shall we smother all this force, and " quench the Spirit" who would use it to save souls? Oh! it is time to act. It is time to " do with our might." It is time to do, because we can. It is time to avoid the curse of not doing. We cannot always live on Icing forgiven. We must some time find our meat in doing the will of our Father in heaven. Shall we begin now? Let us do it, and we shall soon receive the Saviour's forgiving " Come, ye blessed," and His approving " Well done."