HARVARD COPYRIGHT, 1891, BY FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY: THE CAXTON PRESS LOVE: THE SUPREME GIFT. The Greatest Thing in the World. VERY one has asked himself the great EVE question of antiquity as of the modern world: What is the summum bonum ... the supreme good? You have life before you. That is the burning question for you to face: What is the supreme object of desire the supreme gift to covet? We have been accustomed to be told that the greatest thing in the religious world is faith. That has been the key-note for centuries of the evangelical religion; and we have learned to look upon that as the greatest thing in the world. Well; we are wrong. If we have been told that, we have been told wrong. I have taken you in the chapter which I have read to-night (I. Corinthians, xiii) to Christianity at its source; and there we have read, "The greatest of these is love." It is not an oversight. Paul was speaking of faith iust a moment before. He says: “If I have all faith, so that I can remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing." It is not an oversight; and it is not prejudice. A man is apt to recommend to others his own strong point. Love was not Paul's strong point. There is a beautiful tenderness which the observing student can detect as Paul gets oldgrowing and ripening all through his character; but the hand that wrote "The greatest of these is love," when we meet it first, is stained with blood. Nor is Paul singular in singling out love as the summum bonum. The three masters of Christianity are agreed about it. Peter says: "Above all things have fervent love among yourselves." And John goes farther: "God is love." Love Fulfils All. "Love is the fulfilling of the law." Did you ever think what Paul meant by that? In those days men were working their passage to heaven by keeping the Ten Commandments, and the hundred and ten other commandments which they had manufac tured out of them. Christ came and said: "I will show you a more excellent way. If you do one thing, you will do these hundred and ten things, without ever thinking about it-unconsciously. If you love, you will fulfil the whole law." And you can readily see for yourselves how that comes to be. Take any of the commandments. "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." If a man love God, you will not have to tell him that. Love is the fulfilling of that law. "Take not His name in vain." He would never dream of taking His name in vain if he loved Him. "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy." He would be too glad to have a day to meditate upon the object of his affection. Love would fulfil all these laws. And so, if he loved man, you would never require to tell him to honor his father and mother. He would do that without thinking about it. It would be preposterous to tell him not to kill. He would never dream of it. It would be absurd to tell him not to steal. He would never steal from those he loved. He would rather they possessed the goods than that he should possess it. It would be absurd to tell him not to bear false witness against his neighbor. If he loved him it would be the last thing he would do. And you would never have to tell him not to covet what his neighbor had. |