The Water of Life and Other Sermons | Page 3

and perfect condescension, never entered into their
minds. That the gods should keep their immortality to themselves

seemed reasonable enough. That they should bestow it on a few heroes;
and, far away above the stars, give them to eat of their ambrosia, and
drink of their nectar, and so live for ever; that seemed reasonable
enough likewise.
But that the God of gods, the Maker of the universe should say, 'Come,
and drink freely;' that He should stoop from heaven to bring life and
immortality to light,--to tell men what the Water of Life was, and
where it was, and how to attain it; much more, that that God should
stoop to become incarnate, and suffer and die on the cross, that He
might purchase the Water of Life, not for a favoured few, but for all
mankind; that He should offer it to all, without condition, stint, or
drawback;--this, this, never entered into their wildest dreams.
And yet, when the strange news was told, it looked so probable,
although so strange, to thousands who had seemed mere profligates or
outcasts; it agreed so fully with the deepest voices of their own
hearts,--with their thirst for a nobler, purer, more enduring Life,-- with
their highest idea of what a perfect God should be, if He meant to show
His perfect goodness; it seemed at once so human and humane, and yet
so superhuman and divine;--that they accepted it unhesitatingly, as a
voice from God Himself, a revelation of the Eternal Author of the
universe; as, God grant you may accept it this day.
And what is Life? And what is the Water of Life?
What are they indeed, my friends? You will find many answers to that
question, in this, as in all ages: but the one which Scripture gives is this.
Life is none other, according to the Scripture, than God Himself, Jesus
Christ our Lord, who bestows on man His own Spirit, to form in him
His own character, which is the character of God.
He is The one Eternal Life; and it has been manifested in human form,
that human beings might copy it; and behold, it was full of grace and
truth.
The Life of grace and truth; that is the Life of Christ, and, therefore, the
Life of God.

The Life of grace--of graciousness, love, pity, generosity, usefulness,
self-sacrifice; the Life of truth--of faithfulness, fairness, justice, the
desire to impart knowledge and to guide men into all truth. The Life, in
one word, of charity, which is both grace and truth, both love and
justice, in one Eternal essence. That is the life which God lives for ever
in heaven. That is The one Eternal Life, which must be also the Life of
God. For, as there is but one Eternal, even God, so is there but one
Eternal Life, which is the life of God and of His Christ. And the Spirit
by which it is inspired into the hearts of men is the Spirit of God, who
proceedeth alike from the Father and from the Son.
Have you not seen men and women in whom these words have been
literally and palpably fulfilled? Have you not seen those who, though
old in years, were so young in heart, that they seem to have drunk of
the Fountain of perpetual Youth,--in whom, though the outward body
decayed, the soul was renewed day by day; who kept fresh and pure the
noblest and holiest instincts of their childhood, and went on adding to
them the experience, the calm, the charity of age? Persons whose eye
was still so bright, whose smile was still so tender, that it seemed that
they could never die? And when they died, or seemed to die, you felt
that THEY were not dead, but only their husk and shell; that they
themselves, the character which you had loved and reverenced, must
endure on, beyond the grave, beyond the worlds, in a literally
Everlasting Life, independent of nature, and of all the changes of the
material universe.
Surely you have seen such. And surely what you loved in them was the
Spirit of God Himself,--that love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness,
goodness, which the natural savage man has not. Has not, I say, look at
him where you will, from the tropics to the pole, because it is a gift
above man; the gift of the Spirit of God; the Eternal Life of goodness,
which natural birth cannot give to man, nor natural death take away.
You have surely seen such persons--if you have not, I have, thank God,
full many a time;--but if you have seen them, did you not see
this?--That it was not riches which gave them this Life, if they were
rich; or intellect, if they were clever; or science,