What went ye out into the wilderness to see?
The attractiveness of John the Baptist
What is it in human character that exerts the most powerful influence over the hearts of men?
1. Is it what is generally called amiability? Is it “a reed shaken by the wind?” a character that bends at the first expression of adverse opinion? Is this the character that wins the human heart? That which really draws us to itself is the man who is strong enough to resist with tenderness.
2. Are we, then, generally attracted by the attributes of high station? “Clothed in soft raiment.” Few people are insensible to the attraction of high station; it has often the charm of old associations and achievements. But does it draw our hearts? His life may contradict the high ideal his position would lead us to expect; and these decorations are outside the man.
3. Is it mental power which most powerfully affect us? Many a man bows down to intellect who would not to wealth. Intellect is attractive, but its attraction is not universal; it is not powerful; there are large regions of heart in our nature where it does not touch. Intellect may forfeit its power by being divorced from goodness-“More than a prophet.”
4. The feeling which is always inspired by a great religious soul of whose consistency we are well assured, but which we only half understand. Such a character lives before us evidently in constant communion with God while shrouding from the public eye much which our curiosity would fain explore. Without analyzing their feelings, the multitude felt that in coming near to the Baptist they were like men who stood at the base of a mountain which buries its summit in the clouds of heaven. John was not discredited by his imprisonment; he was a prophet still; so our Lord would have them understand. (Canon Liddon.)
Conceptions of religion
I. There are those whose idea of religion is a weak, vacillating, or vague principle. It has no strong hold in their minds or hearts. To how many is religion hardly more than a mere curiosity, or a transcient excitement, like wind blowing among reeds. But these words are meant to describe the preconceptions of the multitude respecting John. For, after all, it may be said of the mass of men that their feeling in regard to religion is not one of curiosity; there is a deep sense of something in the thing itself, and not in the mere manner of presenting it; but it is not held to be a strong principle, fitted for maturity, or, if they do not conceive it to be vacillating and weak, they hold it fitfully, or else it is merely in a traditional way that men hold religion; or perhaps religion is held by them because it is respectable.
II. That there is a class to whom religion is merely an affair of sentiment. They are represented by those people who expected to see the Baptist clothed in soft raiment. There are those to whom religion is a matter of aesthetic beauty. In another view, religion is to some a matter of soft raiment, from the idea that it is merely a matter of comfort and consolation. Others do not like a religion that has anything to do with agitation or reform. There are some who do not like to hear hard, sharp epithets from the preacher.
III. There are those who regard religion in its supernatural character, They look for nothing less remarkable or worthy than a prophet. They view religion solely in its connection with miracles. The supernatural is not the exclusive element in religion; religion touches our common daily life. What is religion to you? (E. H. Chapin.)
The only real moral power influencing the world is courage in acting up to our convictions
Those who have not this are reeds. They may be classified thus:-
1. The irresolute; the soul which never can be got to take a decided line. But it puts off this necessary reformation; and so, although it has got a full flowery head of good intentions, they all blow away in the wills.
2. The backsliding; sincere in its weak, watery way, desiring to do what is right, but never able to stand alone-always falling for want of a prop.
3. The frivolous; unable to form a serious purpose, or take a grave view of its responsibilities. The frivolous mind is a mind outside the person; there is only emptiness within, and the mind is occupied only with externals. It is a more mischievous reed than the preceding; the winds that blow it about are fashion, folly, pleasure.
4. The timorous; a weak little rush, harmless, not noxious. It will not undertake a duty, lest it should not have strength to carry it on. (S. Baring-Gould, M. A.)
A reed is
1. A light man, inconsistent, tossed to and fro; at one time, impelled by the words of flatterers, he asserts something; again, being driven by detractors, he denies it, as a reed is blown in different directions by different winds.
2. A man devoid of truth, virtue, and consistency-without stamina.
3. One who has no fruit of good works to show.
4. He who is delighted with, and feeds upon, the fluctuating pleasures of the world. For a reed is dry, yet it grows beside the waters. (Lapide.)
The ends of the Sacrament
Based on the expression, “What went ye out for to see?” When we are going to an ordinance, we should consider our aim, and what we are going about. In every action we should reflect upon the principles and ends, the reasons that move us to any duty. The ends of the Lord’s Supper are-
I. To be a badge of profession. Profession is a great matter for two reasons.
1. Cases may happen in which profession is like to cost us dear.
2. We are bound to a profession, not in word only, but in deed. He is not a professor whose life is not a hymn to God. What are the excellences of the Christian profession? Sure principles of trust, or commerce, between us and God, for mercies of daily providence, pardon, and life, excellent rewards, and holy precepts of purity and charity. Now if we transgress any of these, we dishonour our profession.
II. To be a seal of the covenant. On our part an obligation to obedience; God bindeth Himself to be our God, and we bind ourselves to be His people.
III. To be a pledge of heaven.
IV. To be a sign, means, and pledge of our communion with Christ.
V. To be a means of our spiritual growth and nourishment.
VI. To be a memorial of Christ’s death. VII. To be a pledge of his coming. If these be the ends of the sacrament, you see what need there is of preparation. (Thomas Manton.)
How may we give Christ a satisfying account why we attend upon the ministry of the Word?-
I. Those that attend upon the ministry of the word should propose unto themselves some end why they do it.
1. Some propose no end at all.
2. Some propose ends downright sinful.
3. Some propose ends frivolous and trifling.
II. Those that propose a good end must call themselves to a strict account how that end is obtained or lost.
1. He must give such an account as a scholar to his teacher, of what he learns.
2. As a steward to his master.
3. As a debtor to his creditor (Matthew 18:23-24).
4. As a malefactor to a judge (Matthew 12:36-37).
III. The strict account we take of ourselves must be frequent. Inferences:
1. It is not the bare hearing of the best preachers that will save you.
2. Remove those hindrances which prevent any soul business.
3. Call yourself to account before and after hearing the Word of God.
4. Christ asks thee here in this world, that thou mayest stand at the last day, when there will be no time to rectify.
5. If you do not give Christ an answer which He will accept, it is vain to expect relief from any other. (S. Annesley, D. D.)
Christ praising the Baptist
The time to praise:-Due praise is to be given to the good parts and practices of others; but rather behind their backs than before their faces, lest we be suspected of flattery, than which nothing is more odious. Aristobulus, the historian, wrote a flattering book of the brave acts of Alexander the Great, and presented it to him. He read it, and then cast it into the river, telling the author that he deserved to be treated as his book was. (John Trapp.)
Men see wheat they go out to see
A geologist and a botanist take a walk together. They go over the same country, but the geologist sees the lie of the strata, the botanist sees the wild flower under the hedge. So it is in the world of the moral and the spiritual. What we are spiritually all goes into our vision. (J. Brierley, B. A.)
The reed of the Jordan
Mr. Macgregor, known as Rob Roy, gives the following precise description of this reed. “There is first a lateral trunk lying on the water and half submerged. This is sometimes as thick as a man’s body, and from its lower side hang innumerable string-like roots, from three to five feet long, and of a deep purple colour. On the upper surface of the trunks the stems grow alternately in oblique rows; their thickness at the junction is often four inches, and their height fifteen feet, gracefully tapering until a: the top is a little round knob, with long, thin, brown, wire-like hairs, eighteen inches long, which rise, and then, recurving, hang about it in a thyrsus-shaped head.”