PERSONAL RELIGIOUS INFLUENCE 409 



express his religion will be in the work he will do for society. It is 

 true that many of those who have loved Jesus well have led the 

 cloistered life, and sought to save their own souls by fleeing from 

 the busy world; but they have not learned well the lesson of the 

 Master. There is a time to sit, like Mary, at Jesus' feet; but there 

 is also a time to rise and do some brave and beneficent thing in 

 Jesus' name. Once and again did he emphasize this truth so plainly 

 and powerfully that it is passing strange that it should so often have 

 been missed by those who have sought to live in his spirit. You 

 will remember how he describes the great surprises of the judgment. 

 "Lord, when saw we thee an hungered and thirsty and naked and did 

 not minister to thee? " They had supposed that they were religious 

 men, and that they would safely stand the last great test ; yet the 

 judge condemns them, because they had done nothing. They had 

 supposed that they were willing to serve God; Jesus shows that the 

 service of God is the service of men, especially of the needy, and 

 these they had refused to serve. In other words, true love for God is 

 bound to express itself in love for the men and women who know the 

 hardships of life and have drunk very deep of its sorrow. " What 

 must I do/' said one who was very earnest, "that I may inherit 

 eternal life? " " Go and sell and give to the poor." In a flash Jesus 

 shows him the quality of his religion. If he really cares about his 

 spiritual life, then he must also care for the poor. The religion which 

 Jesus taught and lived is a religion which touches the lives of men, 

 which takes them by the hand and lifts them up and sets them on 

 their feet. If a man thinks he loves the God whom he has not 

 seen, he can very easily put himself to the test. How much is he 

 doing for humanity? Or rather, how much is he doing for some man, 

 for the man who needs him and whom he can in some way help? 

 What is he doing to relieve the ignorance, the poverty, the vice, 

 the pain, the sorrow, the misery, of which the city streets are so 

 full? Does he pass by on the other side? If he does, then Jesus 

 would say he has no real love for God and, in other words, no re- 

 ligion worthy of the name. It is the duty, and it ought to be the joy 

 of the religious man, to love men, to pity their misery, to do what he 

 can to set at liberty those that are bruised, whether by misfortune 

 or sin. It is the business of his life to work out his own salvation; 

 but he does this most effectively by doing what in him lies to work 

 out theirs. And this he will do because the God and Father in whom 

 he lives is the God and Father of all men, in whose sight the soul of 

 each one of his children is very precious. We are not our own. We 

 belong to God, we belong to society, we belong especially to those 

 whom we can help. 



Thus life with God will be a life of purity, of peace, and of power, 

 a life spent in the service of God, which is the service of man. 



