"And be not conformed to this world; but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God."--Rom. xii:2.

      I. That Christ and his Gospel have a transforming influence can not be questioned. Under it individuals, communities and States are changed.

      1. Turbid natures are subdued, softened, sweetened and sanctified. Peter was once approached by Jesus, who was about to wash his feet, and he said, "Thou shalt never wash my feet." And when the Lord explained this matter, he so changed his mind that he said, "Not my feet only, but also my hands and head." And now, when Christ's life and character and teachings are explained and understood, they change a person's thinking, loving and acting. Hatred is changed to love, enemies to friends, the intemperate to temperate, cursing to praying, the conscience is enlightened and the will is strengthened to do the right.

      2. Communities, too, are transformed. Nor need [286] one go to heathen lands to witness Christ's power. In the city from which I write are two communities almost as distinct as heaven and hell. One of them is under the influence of the priest and politics, and as a result poverty and drunkenness and crime of all classes abound. They would be worse than they are, did not an indirect influence from Christ reach them through "Mary, the mother of God." The protestants, less under the priest and more under Christ, are better developed, yet there is room for improvement among them; so that if Christ should be fully received, every sinner would be transformed and every house would be an asylum of peace and retreat of love.

      3. States are changed. Right religion is not only the basis of individual character, but its power is manifest in and necessary to national greatness. The United States, partially under the influence of Christ, differs from China with its thirty centuries of Paganism. In imperial Pekin infanticide is fearfully prevalent. Scores of children, every night, are thrown into the streets and abandoned by their parents. In the morning dogs and swine are let out to devour them. Then carts are sent around and the living and dead alike are gathered and thrown into a pit. Other districts are still worse, so that nearly two-thirds of the children born are never reared. Now the Christian religion makes especial provision for such exposed children (I Tim. v:10). And, somewhat influenced by this religion, the people of [287] Christ's Transforming Influence the United States provide "Orphan Homes" and "First Day Schools" for poor and abandoned children. Our Briton ancestors were no better than the Chinaman. The pen of the historian trembles to relate, and we shudder at the recital of those things they practiced. Christ's religion has changed them.

      II. The manner of this influence is silent. It is like leaven in three measures of meal. In nature God's power is silent. There is no creaking to the machinery of the universe. Worlds and systems move in silent majesty. The changes of day and night and of the seasons manifest great, silent power. Nature's noises show her weakness. What is the power of electricity, manifest in the thunder, in comparison with the transformation of the winter world to the spring paradise? The Gospel, too, silently works on mind and soul and hand. No booming guns announce its progress. "My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as he shall rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass." Child power is wonderful. A little child's advent into the world is hailed with rejoicing. All things around are concentrated in its interest. There is a way in which children may be said to rule the world. Once strong, tall men as Saul were selected to be rulers. In time women were taken into consideration and counsel, and the world improved by the change. And now four-fifths of all legislation is in behalf of children and coming generations. Their [288] interests control things. The child Jesus came before the man Christ. Nor does the child or man take the heart by storm. But we in our natures feel the want of such a life, such a sacrifice, such a child, such a Christ, such a God, and under their power we are silently transformed.

      Little faith can be put in sudden conversions. Some speak of being changed "quick as the spark from the smitten steel." But this gospel power does not work in that way. It comes "line upon line, precept upon precept," from childhood to manhood. And at last the argument comes that turns the soul in favor of Christ. On the mountain top the dews and rains and melting snows settle through the sands and rocks, and at the mountain's base the shepherd removes a stone and the spring leaps out. The spring was not then and there formed, but was made manifest. So the influence of earlier years may be brought out to view by a sermon, and the silent influences are manifest in producing a new life. In this land none are devoid of these influences. They may be repressed, but if persons are true to themselves and Christ, the transformation must be made visible.

      III. In considering some of the details of this influence, allow the head and heart and hand to represent the whole person. Accepting this order, there will be light for the head, and love for the heart, and labor for the hand.

      1. The head, or mind, has much to do in religion. [289] A thing with no head or brains, though in the form of a man, can not embrace the religion of Christ. The whole person is to be transformed through the renewing of the mind (Rom. xii:2).

      Some would have religion consist entirely of doing--visiting the widow and fatherless, and in deeds of mercy. These things can not be divorced from Christianity, but they receive their value from the motive prompting to them. Love and respect for God's authority lead to action, and labor performed should be guided by a sound mind. Things God never made are very religious, if doing alone is religion. God never made a mule or a mill, and they are all the time doing, packing loads and grinding grain, and no one thinks of calling them religious, or their doing religion.

      Others talk of religion as consisting of love, and it is an essential part. "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not love, it profiteth me nothing." And we sing:

      Poetic license may admit this form of expression; but is love more than a link in the chain or a strand of the cord that binds the soul to God? A [290] man may have the ability to do, of a Samson, so that he could carry off the gates of Gaza, and may be filled with love and zeal and energy, and yet act very silly. Doing and loving need the guidance of a sound mind. Hence, "God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power (ability to do), and of love, and of a sound mind."

      There are many crazy religionists. Ordinary lunatics we treat kindly, and put them where they can hurt no one, and use means to restore their senses. Shall we have less care for these moonstruck religionists? They live more under Moses than Christ. Christ has done something for them, and they see things dimly, men as trees walking; but their eyes are not opened sufficiently, and they have a blind religion of impulse and feelings. They are very uncertain and crazy Peter like, under certain circumstances they would smite off a man's ear with sword, and when the excitement passes away, in the presence of a damsel they'll deny the Lord. Now, God says: "Let there be light." He sent Paul to turn men from darkness to light. Truth transforms the mind, and guides the head and heart and hand and feelings for the glory of God. Rationalism is a reaction from this blind Papal and sectarian religion. Scripture teaching would lead to the golden medium where feelings and reason would sit at the feet of Jesus, and learn to glorify God through his transforming truth. Pass on the light!

      2. The hurt or affections are changed by love. [291] Light shows the things of heaven. We set our affections on things above. We become like what we love and worship. We think Christ, and talk Christ, and love Christ, and worship Christ, and become conformed to' his image. In Central Park are globe mirrors reflecting the landscape, and a person is transfigured as he stands before them, so "we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord."

      There is power in kindness. Dumb animals feel its influence. A balky horse is not whipped in these days by his master. He first treats him kindly, and then gives him a new idea by putting sand in his mouth or a pebble in the ear, and under these influences he forgets his stubbornness and pulls astonishingly well.

      The warden of the state prison in Connecticut once received to the prison a strong, powerful man, who had been the terror of the country for seventeen years. He said to him,: "I will treat you kindly and give you the largest possible liberty, if you will not get me into difficulty." The influence of this kindness was not perceptible at first. The prisoner tried to escape, and the warden was compelled to put him in irons, and was about to incarcerate him in a solitary, dark cell. Before entering it, the little, gentle warden looked him in the face, and said "Have you treated me as I deserve?" And the great, iron-hearted criminal wept and said: "I have [292] been a very devil for seventeen years, and you have treated me kindly and like a man." The warden gave him the free range of the prison, and he was a subdued man to the end of his imprisonment. Persons can not long withstand the influence of kindness.

      Now, the heart is not only made for kindness, but for love. A Jesus without tears would not meet the wants of mankind. Nor would a saviour without love fill the soul, and transform the heart into that Christ-likeness which is joy and peace and eternal blessedness. This love is stronger than law or death, and is of God, and lifts us to his blessed presence, where there are pleasures forevermore.

      3. The hand represents the ability to do. Under the reign of Christ, persons are to "cease to do evil and learn to do well." This doing, inspired by love and guided by reason, has a magical influence on our lives. We are created in Christ Jesus unto good works. Good works are those good actions that spring from good motives, are spiritual and have for their object the well-being of mankind. Failing of these, the objects of the Church are not accomplished, and the persons thus neglecting their opportunities become dwarfed and selfish and dead. Good works give life to faith and love. We show our faith by our works.

      In the Church of thing to do. Singing preaching all have a Christ every man has something to do. Singing and praying and paying and preaching all have a reflex influence on the [293] individual, and the hand becomes so transformed and accustomed to doing good, that it is easy and inspiring.

      Dreamers are some professors. They find nothing to do, or no hands to do with, or no time to devote to good works. They dream of good singing, but never learn to sing themselves. They dream of benevolences, if they had the means, but they never give, because they can not do a big thing. They dream of happy dying, and do not seem to understand that this comes of happy living. They are enraptured with visions of heaven, but seem to have lost sight of the realities of this life, which transform us for the joys and realities of a never-ending life. They say: "Oh, if Jesus were on earth now, how we would minister to his necessities!" and seem to forget that if they do it to his brethren, it is as unto him. Let every person in the Church have an appropriate work to do, and carry it on to success. "He went about doing good."

      IV. A scriptural example of this influence now remains to be presented. An illustration of a theme by a living example or a life invests it with a reality that is desirable. Our religion is a greater power in the world for having been identified with a person, a life, the life of Christ.

      Now, if a person wants to become a Christian, he will find, whatever his condition may be, a living example in Acts of Apostles of his own condition. Let him find that example, and do the things he did [294] under the direction of the Apostles, and there will be certainty in his efforts that will send him on his way rejoicing.

      The scriptural example selected to illustrate the present subject may not be so apparent to all, or so satisfying as others that might have been selected; but it certainly is not entirely devoid of interest and applicability. John is the man. So much of the sunny side of his life appears in the writings of the New Testament, that the impression is made that he was always gentle, good and genial. Yet he was once a Boanerges, a Son of Thunder, impetuous, vehement, unmanageable in spirit as is the thunder. With this dare-devil spirit, and ambitious for a place in Christ's kingdom, which he supposed was at hand, he once came to Jesus and asked for a position, a chief place, at his right hand or left, and he declared himself ready to face the terrors of the cup and baptism that awaited Christ, that he might serve his ambitious purposes. Jesus intimates to him that he had better wait for a fuller understanding of things. Some of this spirit of thunder must be driven out, and love must take its place.

      Once he found persons casting out devils in the name of Christ, and because they did not come to his notion of things, he forbade them. This sectarian spirit which he exhibited is always contemptible, and Jesus ever condemned it. And has not the time come to rise above this dog-in-the-manger style, and admit the good wherever it is [295] found? Truth should never be sacrificed, but goodness should be recognized wherever found.

      At another time he wanted fire called down from heaven to destroy certain persons. Now, these examples indicate that he was a hard case, and truly a son of thunder. But see him when changed by Christ's presence and grace and love and gospel! He evidently had capacity and a receptive disposition, and passing through a wonderful transformation, he became the disciple whom Jesus loved. On one occasion Peter, feeling that the gulf between himself and Jesus was so great, asked John to speak to Jesus for him about a certain matter. This indicates a great change in John. And it was no small compliment to John's character, when on the cross Jesus commended to him the care of his mother.

      The spirit of his Epistles is one of love. "Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us!" And tradition says that when he was too old to meet with the disciples, he would gather his friends around him and say, "Little children, love one another." And so he was waiting to be like Him; "for we shall see him as he is."

      In the Gospel which he wrote, how he is wrapped up in Jesus! He goes back to the beginning, and walks with him on the abyss of eternity. He traces his genealogy, not through patriarchs and kings, but from Jehovah's bosom, and then he is seemingly intent on catching all his heavenly words and secret spirit. Now, with this idea before the mind, we [296] watch with interest the interview with Thomas, and Lazarus, and the blind man and the Samaritan woman, and the interview with Nicodemus, when all were sleeping save the stars and Jesus.

      And we can not close this imperfect sketch without referring to him on Patmos, amid the awful glories and grandeurs of the Apocalyptic vision. He is now in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ a calm and unimpetuous old man, and stands amid all those strange sights and sounds unmoved by fear or impulse. It is only recorded of him once, that he fell down as dead. He had learned that the great conflict of the ages is to be carried on, not with carnal weapons, but with the word of God. His thoughts are changed. His loves are different. He is patient under very trying circumstances, while he is engaged in suffering and doing for Christ. Being now fully transformed into the likeness of Christ's character, in his everlasting presence his body shall be fashioned like unto his glorious body.

      In conclusion, dear brethren in Christ, be assured that the path of the just is as a light that shines more and more unto the perfect day. Are your minds daily renewed? Remember our Bible is a daily Bible, and our light is the truth of God. Are you children of the light, shining in the midst of a perverse generation? Men are dying in darkness around us, and we must be quick. Be ye filled with this light? Do not exercise private judgment for once in your life, and never improve your [297] conversion, but grow up into Christ in all things--grow, grow, GROW!

      Let love also abound; it has a magical transforming power. Set your affections on things above, and

[NTC2 286-298]