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OLD WINE AND NEW:


Occasional Discourses.


BY

THE REV. JOSEPH CROSS, D.D., LL.D.,

AUTHOR OF "EVANGEL," "KNIGHT-BANNERET," "COALS FROM THE ALTAR,"
"PAULINE CHARITY," AND "EDENS OF ITALY."




NEW YORK:

THOMAS WHITTAKER,

2 and 3 Bible House.

1884.





  Copyright, 1883,
  By JOSEPH CROSS.


  Franklin Press:
  RAND, AVERY, AND COMPANY,
  BOSTON.








DEDICATORY EPISTLE.


To THOMAS WHITTAKER, Esq., Publisher, New York.

My Dear Friend: In former times and other lands, when one
wrote a book, he inscribed the volume to some distinguished
personage--a bishop, a baron, a monarch, a magnate in the world of
letters--through whose name it might win its way to popular favor, and
achieve a success hardly to be hoped for from its own merit. Such
overshadowing oaks seemed necessary to shield from sun and storm the
tender undergrowth; and the dew that lay all night upon their branches
the breezy morning shook off in showers of diamonds upon the humbler
herbage at their roots. In an age pre-eminently of self-reliance and a
country characterized no less by personal than political independence,
authors have learned at length to walk alone, marching right into the
heart of the public with no patronage but that of the publisher; and if
a book have not the intrinsic qualities to bear the scorching beams and
freezing blasts of criticism, down it must go amidst the _debris_
of earth's abortive ambitions and ruined hopes. Not so much from
conscious need of help as from high esteem of the noblest personal
qualities, therefore, I beg leave upon this page to couple with my own
a worthier name. Two years ago, when I placed in your trusty hands the
manuscript of Knight-Banneret, I had the least possible idea
of the harvest which might grow from so humble a seed-grain cast into a
very questionable soil. The result was an encouraging disappointment;
and Evangel soon followed, enlarging the horizon of hope; and
Edens of Italy sent a refreshing aroma over all the landscape;
and Coals from the Altar kindled assuring beacon-fires for the
adventurer; and Pauline Charity, supported by Faith and Hope,
walked forth in queenly state. During the publication of these several
productions, so pleasant has been our intercourse--so great your
kindness, candor, courtesy, magnanimity, hospitality, and every other
social virtue--that I look back upon the period as one of the happiest
of my life; and now, at the close of the feast, hoping that our last
bout may be the best, I cordially invite you to share with me Old
Wine and New.

Yours till Paradise,
  JOSEPH CROSS

Nov. 1, 1883.




PREFACE.


Dear Reader: In the preface to Pauline Charity, did
not the writer promise thee that volume should be his last? Some months
later, however, at the bottom of the homiletical barrel, he found a few
old acquaintances, in threadbare and tattered guise, smiling
reproachfully out of the dust of an undeserved oblivion. He beckoned
them forth, gave them new garments, and bade them go to the printer.
And lo! here they are--twenty-two of them--in comely array, with
fresh-anointed locks, knocking modestly at thy door.

If any of the former groups from the same family were deemed worthy of
thy hospitality--if any of the twenty-two Evangelists
gladdened thy soul with good tidings--if any of the twenty-two
Knights-Banneret stimulated thy zeal in the holy conflict--if
any of the twenty white-hooded sisters of Charity warmed thy
heart with words of loving kindness--if any of the sixty seraphs,
winged with sunbeams, laid upon thy lips a Coal from the
Altar--if any of the twelve cherubs, fresh from the Edens of
Italy, led thee through pleasant paths to goodly palaces and
blooming arbors--turn not away unheard these twenty-two strangers, but
welcome them graciously to the fellowship of thy house, and perchance
the morrow's dawn may disclose the wings beneath their robes.

But if tempted to discard them as the vagrant offspring of a senile
vanity thrust out to seek their fortune in the world of letters, know
thou that such temptation is of the Father of lies. For not all of
these are thy patriarch's Benjamins--sons of his old age. The leader of
the band is his very Reuben--the beginning of his strength. Another is
his lion-bannered Judah, washing his garments in the blood of grapes.
In another may be recognized his long-lost Joseph, found at last in
Pharaoh's chariot. And several others, peradventure, more ancient than
thy father, though bearing neither gray beard nor wrinkled brow. And
the consciousness of a better ambition than vanity ever inspired
prompts their commission to the public, to speak a word in season to
him that is weary--to comfort the mourners in Zion, giving them beauty
for ashes, the oil of joy for weeping, the garment of praise for the
spirit of heaviness, and filling the vale of Bochim with songs in the
night. Nay, if the mixture of metaphors be not offensive to thy
fastidious rhetoric, these brethren are sent down into Egypt to procure
corn for thee and thy little ones, O Reader! that ye perish not in the
famine of the land.

"Go to! the tropical language is misleading. We open the door to thy
children, and find nothing but a hamper of Wine--twenty-two
bottles--some labelled Old, and others New."

As thou wilt, my gentle critic! Perhaps twenty-two jars of water only.
Yet healthfully clear, and sweet to the taste, it is hoped thou wilt
find the beverage; and if the Lord, present at the feast, but deign to
look at it, thou mayest wonder that the good wine has been kept till
now.

Of Edward Irving, when he died fifty years ago, a London editor wrote:
"He was the one man of our time who more than all others preached his
life and lived his sermons." To preach one's life were hardly
apostolical, though to live one's sermons might be greatly Christian.
At the former the author never aimed; of the latter there is little
danger of his being suspected. Yet this book is in some sort the record
of his personal history. For a farewell gift to the world, he long
contemplated an autobiography--had actually begun the work, written
more than a hundred pages, and sketched a promising outline of the
whole; when, in an hour of indigestion, becoming disgusted, he dropped
the enterprise, and made his manuscript a burnt offering to the
"blues." As a substitute for the failure, these discourses represent
him in the successive stages of his ministry, being arranged in the
chronological order of production and delivery, with dates and
occasions in footnotes--the only autobiography he could produce, the
only one doubtless to be desired. Should grace divine make it in any
measure effectual to the spiritual illumination of those who honor it
with a perusal, he will sing his _Nunc Dimittis_ with thankful
heart, and wait calmly for the day when every faithful worker "shall
have praise of God." Farewell.

J. C.

Feast of All Saints, 1883.




CONTENTS.


Discourse.

     I. Filial Hope. 1829
    II. Rest for the Weary. 1830
   III. My Beloved and Friend. 1833
    IV. Refuge in God. 1838
     V. Parental Discipline. 1840
    VI. Joy of the Law. 1842
   VII. Sojourning with God. 1858
  VIII. Building for Immortality. 1859
    IX. Wail of Bereavement. 1862
     X. Wisdom and Weapons. 1863
    XI. Love tested. 1866
   XII. Manifold Temptations. 1866
  XIII. Contest and Coronation. 1866
   XIV. Calvary Token. 1866
    XV. Heroism Triumphant. 1868
   XVI. Fraternal Forgiveness. 1869
  XVII. Christ with his Ministers. 1872
 XVIII. Kept from Evil. 1873
   XIX. Contending for the Faith. 1874
    XX. The Fruitless Fig-Tree. 1876
   XXI. Christian Contentment. 1883
  XXII. "Ye know the Grace." 1883




OLD WINE AND NEW.




I.

FILIAL HOPE.[1]

Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we
shall be; but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him;
for we shall see him as he is.--1 John iii. 2.


"I am to depart, you to remain; but which shall have the happier lot,
who can tell?" So spake Socrates to his friends just before he drank
the fatal hemlock. In all the utterances of the ancient philosophy
there is no sadder word. The uncertainty of the hereafter, the
impenetrable gloom that shrouds the state of the departed, sets the
contemplative soul shivering with mortal dread. Like the expiring
Hobbes, more than two thousand years later, the grand old Athenian felt
himself "taking a leap in the dark." In his case, however, there was
more excuse than in that of the modern unbeliever. The dayspring from
on high had not yet visited mankind. The morning star was still below
the horizon. Four centuries must pass before the rising Sun of
righteousness could bring the perfect day. The Christ came, the true
Light of the world; and life and immortality, dawning from his manger,
culminated upon his sepulchre. Redeeming Love has revealed to us more
of God and man than all the sages of antiquity ever knew; and our
reviving and ascending Redeemer has shed a flood of radiance upon the
grave and whatever lies beyond. In the immortal Christ we have a
sufficient answer to the patriarch's question--"If a man die, shall he
live again?" In his mysteriously constituted personality taking our
nature into union with the Godhead, by his vicarious passion ransoming
that nature, and then rising with it from the dead and returning with
it to heaven, he assures all who believe in him of an actual alliance
with the living God and all the blissful immunities of life eternal.
And thus the apostle's statement becomes the best expression of our
filial hope in Christ: "Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it
doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that, when he shall
appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is."

The ground of our glorious hope as disciples of Christ is found in our
gracious state as sons of God. But is not this the relation of all men?
Originally it was, but is not now. By creation indeed "we all are his
offspring," but not by adoption and regeneration. Sin has cut off from
that original relation the whole progeny of Adam, and disinherited us
of all its rights and privileges. The paternal likeness is effaced from
the human soul. Alienated from the life of God, men have become
children of the wicked One. Only by restoring grace--"a new creation in
Christ Jesus"--can they regain what they have lost. To effect this,
came forth the Only Begotten from the bosom of the Father, and gave
himself upon the cross a ransom for the sinful race. Whosoever
believeth in him is saved, restored, forgiven, renewed after the image
of his Creator in righteousness and true holiness. Jesus himself
preached to Nicodemus the necessity of this new birth, and "born of
God" is the apostolic description of the mighty transformation. More
than any outward ordinance is here expressed--more than mere morality,
or reformation of life--a clean heart created, a right spirit renewed,
the inception of a higher life whereby the soul becomes partaker of the
Divine Nature. All this, through faith in Christ, by the power of the
Holy Ghost. Now there is reconciliation and amity with God--"an
everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure." More; there is
sympathy, and sweet communion, and joyful co-operation, and spiritual
assimilation, and oneness of will and desire, and free access to the
throne of grace in every time of need. "And because ye are sons, God
hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying--Abba,
Father." "And if children, then heirs--heirs of God, and joint-heirs
with Jesus Christ." And oh! what an inheritance awaits us in the
glorious manifestation of our Lord, when all his saints shall be
glorified together with him! For, "it doth not yet appear what we shall
be; but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for
we shall see him as he is."


Our sonship, you see, is the ground of our hope. Our hope, you will now
see, is worthy of our sonship.

At present, indeed, our glorious destiny is not apparent. By faith we
see it, dim and distant, as through the shepherds' glass; in hope we
wait for it with calm patience, or press toward it with strong desire;
but what it is--"the glory that shall be revealed in us"--we know not,
and cannot know, till mortality shall be swallowed up of life. It is
spiritual; we are carnal. It is heavenly; we are earthly. It is
infinite; we are finite. It is altogether divine: we are but human.
Some of God's artists, as St. Paul and St. John, have given us gorgeous
pictures of it, which we gaze at with shaded eyes; but while we study
them, we cannot help feeling that they fall far short of the copied
original. In our present state, what idea can we form of the condition
of the soul, and the mode of its subsistence, when dislodged from the
body? Nay, what idea can we form of the natural body developing into
the spiritual, and all its rudimental powers unfolding in their
perfection? Or, to speak more accurately and more scripturally, what
idea can we form of the resurrection body, awaking from its long sleep
in the dust, re-organized and re-invested--with new beauties, perhaps
new organs, new senses, new faculties, all glorious in immortality? And
the enfranchised intellect, who can guess the grandeur of its
destiny--what new provinces of thought, new discoveries of truth, new
revelations of science, new disclosures of the mysteries of nature and
of God? And the spirit--the ransomed and purified spirit--who can
imagine what perfection of love, what afflu