The Christian Ideal

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Sep 30, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 38.

The Christian Ideal.

THIS is ideal Christianity—to have the mind of Christ. It is not to join a church, pay so much money, be decorous in life. It means the living, or the seeking to live, that ideal life that Christ lived here on earth. It means that one shall forget himself in the nobility of work. He who would possess a mind of Christ must be content to organize his thoughts, and do his work even though he may have no name of earthly immortality. It means to do some helpful human work, of brain or hand—to do it gladly, faithfully, as long as life or strength lasts. It is cowardice, when so much needs to be done, to ever dream of a liberation from the necessity of labor.

Let the weak and the aged sit in the sheltered corner of the household fire, but to those who can, God says, “Work.” It means to irradiate this common life of ours with divine motives; if one is a mother in a humble home, to fill it with taste and sympathy, the feeling of moral beauty, the tenderness of love. Difficult? Yes, it is. To do common things well is the most difficult of things. There are ten painters who can paint a dreamy Madonna to one who can depict a beggar boy trying to extract a thorn from his naked foot. In an hour of high impulse one does an uncommon deed with dramatic effect. But it is harder to do that which is infinitely more needed to make divine our daily life by drenching it with the Spirit of Christ.

So he who would lead a Christian life, called to be a knight, a hero, a worker, whose life tells men that there is an eternal God who loves good and hates evil, and who helps every little bit of holiness in a human heart, whether it be found in a great city, or Western prairie, or Jutuma Fountain. He is to strike great blows against all evil—intemperance, ignorance, idleness, luxury, hypocrisy. He is to take his religion into his home and plant even more thickly the joy-flowers there. This is a great work? Yes, but a great nature is called to great things. A hard world? Yes, but a place for heroes! Christ calls a man to that which is infinite.—Christian Union.