LIKE the destructive hurricane is the life that is out of harmony with the law and purpose of God. The lashing whip of the cyclone has no business but to destroy. It can never rebuild the structure which its merciless power strews upon the ground. So that self-centered life leaves a wake of ruin in whatever path it takes. But that is not all of its work; like a masterless locomotive it crashes along to its own ruin. On the other hand, the true worship of God and obedience to His law lead the mind out of the dark fogs of the valley of death, and the soul up onto the Pisgah heights to commune with the Eternal One.
THE experiences of ancient Israel are full of priceless lessons for us in this matter. They are written for our admonition; they are beacon lights along the pathway of the child of God; and in God's dealings with that people all the power of words is used and all the infinite storehouse of love is opened, to cover every need of man's nature. In those experiences are the faithful warnings of the fruits of disobedience as well as the sure promises of the fruits and rewards of righteousness. The declaration that the iniquities of the fathers would be visited upon the children to the third and fourth generation of them that hated God, while true and sure, is no truer or surer than that other declaration that the mercies of God would be visited upon thousands of generations of them that loved God and kept His commandments. That the unrighteous life of the parent shows itself in the sinful tendencies of the children is a proven fact. It is in perfect harmony with the law of growth; and, were it not for the uplifting influence, the up-drawing power, of the Spirit of God still striving with man, the baneful influence of no single life could ever be checked in the continuing posterity of that individual. It is through the mercy of God alone—and that to those even who are in rebellion against Him—that the corroding, corrupting, sin-breathing influence goes no further than it does.
A Nave in Westminster Abbey.
ON the other hand, there is no power but the power of self, in our own choice, that can prevent the power of a righteous life working out, and inducing to, righteousness in succeeding generations of men. It is one of the laws of God, as the sowing is, so shall the reaping be. So the influence of a righteous life in this earth is more far-reaching than that of a sinful life, except as it is hindered by the individual choice of wrong. The ultimate fruit of the influence of righteousness is eternal life in the kingdom of God. The ultimate fruit of the influence of unrighteousness is eternal death. The one goes on forever; the other is cut short as unfit for the universe of God. Our choice may clip for us a branch from the tree of eternity. It withers in the blast of trial,2and we, the branch, are lost forever. But through all the ramifications of a righteous life there pulses a power which nothing but the human choice can check. In that declaration that God would show mercy to thousands of generations of them that love Him and keep His commandments there is a lesson for us in the far-reaching influence of a righteous, God-loving life—the lesson also that sin and sin's influence, tho powerful, are not eternal; that they are not limitless even in this life, for the power of God is against them on behalf of all who seek release from the clutch of their talons.
THE lesson is taught again in the seventeenth chapter of Jeremiah, in the following words: "The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond; it is graven upon the tablet of their heart, and upon the horns of your [margin, 'their'] altars; whilst their children remember their altars and their Asherim by the green trees upon the high hills." This wicked, polluting idol worship was one of the most debasing sins of apostate Israel. The Lord declares that it was graven upon their hearts with pen of iron and point of diamond, showing the tenacity of the mark which it would leave upon the character; and not only that, but the concluding clause quoted shows the result of that evil parental influence upon the children. They remembered the wicked deeds of their parents to participate in them. Their memories were stored with the frantic rites and ceremonies which they saw their parents observe in this degrading worship, and their imagination was alive with idol images. There was exemplified the cankering influence of unrighteousness upon the children and the children's children. Every evil thought leaves a scar upon the heart of him who thinks it, and every evil act of the parent leaves a sore upon the soul of the child he has brought into the world. You can not harbor in your heart a greed for gold without bringing the rheumatism of sin into all the articulating parts of the spiritual man. You can not indulge that greed worship without inoculating or infecting your offspring with a soul-blighting sickness. Just so in every other line of self-service and self-worship. It is so written in the economy of nature. Like brings like; and yet upon the trunk of that tree, all gnarled and bearing but wild fruit, the husbandman may set a graft that will bear fruit of the most delightful character. So in the life of a child weighed down with an inheritance of evil, God, through the surrender of that life to Him, can bring forth fruit unto His glory throughout eternity.
OUR load of sins may be greater than our power to lift ourselves under them; they may have dyed our character with the indelible scarlet; they may have left scars which neither power nor skill of man can eradicate; and yet there is a power for us to lift us above the weight of that load, a remedy for the indelible stain of sin, a Physician who can take away the deepest scar that sin can make. David was well-nigh overwhelmed by the crushing weight of his sin; but he declared: "He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay; and He set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings." The Lord calls to us through the prophet Isaiah: "Come now, and let us reason together, saith Jehovah: tho your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; tho they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." That takes out the indelible stain; but what about the scars that sin had made? "The light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day that Jehovah bindeth up the hurt of His people, and healeth the stroke of their wound." Isa. 30: 26. When the Lord Himself heals the hurt of His people and the stroke of their wound, that healing leaves no scar. The universe is then free of sin and the marks of sin. The influence of every wicked life is done, while the influence of every life of righteousness goes on through eternal years, ever increasing to the glory of God and the happiness of the ransomed host.
