We hear a great deal said about being christians. We hear a great many exhortations to be christians. This is all well. All this we ought to be. But will those who are freest to adopt such language tell us what it is to be a christian? We fear an unwarrantable use is made of the term; that it is used in too general and vague a sense, as though it signified the possession of no particular graces, and the performance of no particular duties. We respect the inquiry which should be instituted in regard to every one, as to whether or not he is a christian. We accept your exhortations to be christians. But what is it to be a christian?
All I want to know, says one, about an individual, is whether or not he is a christian. I care not to what body he belongs, or whether he belongs to any or not, or what his peculiar views may be; but is he a christian? This is all we want to know also; but still the inquiry remains, What is it to be a christian?
Speak to one of the sure word of prophecy that shineth like a lamp in a dark place; call his attention to the light of present truth; (and every age has its present truth, or Peter was utterly at fault in speaking of it;) and he answers, "Oh, I care nothing for that. I only want to know if a man is a christian. You may have any quantity of present truths and not be a christian." It is true that a man may be in possession of present truth, the truth that particularly concerns the generation in which he lives, and yet not be a christian; for theory is n't practice, belief isn't godliness. But there is another proposition equally true; and that is, that a person will not be very apt to be a christian who is not following the light of God's word, and living up to the present truth.
Urge upon a person the claims of the Sabbath, and very likely he will refer you to some examples who have lived and died before him, and tell you gravely that they were christians; that they kept the first day of the week; that they were blessed in so doing; that he can do as they did, be also blessed, and be a christian too. Therefore away with these minor points, these side questions, these strict particulars; and thus with the cry of Christian! Christian! he drowns all inquiry and answers all questions.
But this will not do. These "glittering generalities" will not answer the question. A man may not be a christian now for doing what constituted people such in times past; for if he does no more than they, he is governed by different motives; he has to reject positive light, since that light has now come; and in doing this he cannot be a christian.
Still, what is it to be a christian? To have faith in Christ, to love Christ, to belong to Christ, of course. But there is something more. Those who give it the most indefinite application, have never presumed to separate it wholly from the love of God also. No; the term Christian must signify not only a follower of the Lamb, but an obedient servant of the living God. But what is it to love and serve God? If an Apostle has answered this question, no one will deny us the privilege of adopting his answer. He says, "This is the love of God that we keep his commandments." 1 John v, 3. No comment is needed here; for surely no person who loves God will refuse to keep his commandments. But there is one question more: What are God's commandments? Think you of anything more appropriately such, than what he uttered with his own voice from the summit of Sinai, and wrote with his own finger on the tables of stone? commandments which had been known and kept from creation down? commandments which the Saviour said he came not to destroy, and which he told the young man he must keep if he would enter into life? commandments which the apostle Paul said were holy, just and good, and which he delighted in after the inward man? commandments in which the apostle James exhorts us to continue, and to fulfill according to the scripture? commandments which stand, in this dispensation, side by side with the faith of Jesus, and through obedience to which we gain at last our passports through the gates of the eternal city? Are not these the commandments of God? and is it not the love of God that we keep them?
We have so far progressed in our definition of a christian, that we have found it to mean one who unites with the faith of Jesus the love of God and obedience to his commandments. And the commandments are those which form the constitution of God's moral government. One thing more: What do these commandments require? You will allow us, reader, to refer to one which is more openly violated than any other. Its requirement runs as follows: "Remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy: the seventh day is the Sabbath," &c. Ah! here is the rock of offence, here is the stone of stumbling, to the would-be christians of these last days. Any way to be a christian except by the way of the cross! Any way to show our love to God, except by obedience.
Christians form no party. They constitute no sect or clique. They are simply the people of God in the world of their enemies. They stand in the same catalogue with the Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles and Disciples of Jesus. Their only discipline is the word of God, their only test, the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.
We do not want to see a person therefore, when we enjoin upon him the duties incumbent on us in our fallen condition, when we present before him the crosses which lie directly in our pathway as we would retrace our steps back to eternal life—we do not want to see him then all evaporate in rhetorical flourishes on the word, christian. It takes something to make a christian; it costs something to be one; it involves some sacrifice. It is the deed and not the name that gives them entity.
Reader, would you behold a christian? Find a man who keeps the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, and behold him there. We do not say that all who profess to keep them, are christians; but we do say that no one can really keep them and yet not be a christian; and no one can now-a-days be a christian and not keep them. These constitute the only rock-bottom on which we can rear a structure which will weather the fury of the coming storm. For the rains will descend, the floods come, the winds blow and beat upon it, and he who has built upon other foundation, will find at last his most cherished hopes tottering to destruction in the sliding sand.
Are you a christian? If not, haste to join the number. Remember the steps by which you are to gain a position among God's elect. It is first, repentance towards God; for it is his law you have violated, and thus become a sinner; and second, faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ; for it is through faith in him that you are to become absolved from guilt which of yourself you could never remove. Acts xx, 21. The Lord help you to start in his service now, and to be finally of that innumerable company which shall pass in grand review before the Captain of our salvation, when he shall see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied.