Sermons at Rugby | Page 4

of the Gospel
becomes to you, if you are once roused to this kind of feeling; if you
are feeling all the time, here is the spirit which should be dominating
my own life and determining it, here are the thoughts, ideas, and views
of conduct which should be mine also. How does my common life fit
with all this? And it is with something like this feeling in your minds
that I would ask you to consider the text I have just read to you. "Jesus
took a child and set him in the midst of them. He took him up in His
arms and said, Whosoever shall receive one of such children in My
name, receiveth Me." And while we are considering it, let us notice
also that in St. Matthew's narrative there are two other very emphatic
expressions. "Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye
shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven"; and "Whoso shall offend
one of these little ones that believe in Me, it were better for him that a
millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were drowned in the
depth of the sea. . . . Take heed that ye despise not one of these little
ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold
the face of My Father which is in heaven."
Here, then, is the child taken up by Jesus and set in the midst; we know
nothing more of him but this one thing, that he represents to us our
Lord's Divine love of little children, and His high estimate of childhood,
as the mysterious embodiment of that character and those qualities
which bring us close to the Divine life.
But this is quite enough to make us listen to the lessons of thought and
warning and hope, which Jesus expounds to us as He stands with the
child in His arms. His words may very well set every one of us thinking
about our own life and conduct. We look at this scene--the disciples
standing round, their hearts occupied, as ours are apt to be, with their
own ambitions, rivalries, and jealousies, and Jesus in the midst with the
little child; and we cannot mistake or misinterpret the lessons He
teaches us, the lessons which welled up in His heart whenever He saw,
or met, or took up in His arms, and blessed a little child.

"Let every child you meet," he clearly says to us, "remind you that if
you desire to be My disciple and to win a place in My kingdom, you
must fling off selfishness, and put in its place the spirit of service and
tenderness." "He that would be first must be servant of all." "You must
humble yourself as this little child."
And then He adds the blessing and the warning:--"Whoso shall receive
one such child in My name receiveth Me; but whosoever shall offend
one of these little ones, it were better for him that a millstone were
hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea."
We may pause for a moment to consider what it is in childhood, what
are the gifts, qualities, characteristics of the child, that drew from our
Lord this special love and care and these injunctions to His followers.
We do well to bear them in mind, because He has declared with such
emphasis that we have no part in His kingdom unless we retain or
recover these gifts. And we should bear them in mind, because of the
blessing promised to those who help to preserve these qualities in
others. Receive, help, cherish, or protect a child, make the way of
goodness easy to him, and shield him from evil, and Christ declares
that inasmuch as you have done it to the least of all His little ones, you
have done it unto Him.
On the other hand, offend any such child, that is to say, hinder, or
mislead, spoil or degrade him in any way; do anything to rob a child of
any of these Divine gifts, rob him of his innocence, or trustfulness, or
his guileless heart, and sow the seeds of evil habits or tastes in their
place, and you know the denunciation or curse which the Divine voice
has laid upon you for your evil deed.
A child, then, is, as it were, a living symbol of that which draws to us
the love of Christ, and we cannot doubt that he is so by virtue of his
innocence, his obedient spirit, his guilelessness, or simplicity of
character, his trustfulness, and by all the untarnished and unspoilt
possibilities of goodness in him.
It is in the blessed endowment of such gifts as these that the little child
looks in