A Groundless Fear Of God

 "Edom refused to give Israel passage through his border." Numbers 20:21.

       The world has all along been refusing to let Christ through. It has never had room for Him within the inn; it has relegated Him to the manger. It wants Him to be kept apart. It is willing to visit Him occasionally in the manger - even, at times, to bring a little gold and frankincense. But it does not wish Him to become a force in its own affairs. Why so; what is it afraid of? The same thing which Edom feared. Edom was afraid that the hordes of Israel would tear up her cultivated fields and destroy her national produce. The world fears that Christ will tear up human instincts and make men unnatural. The world is wrong; we are never so natural as when we are Christians. What kills naturalness is self-consciousness; it makes us either too confident or too shy. When I am too confident I am thinking about myself; when I am too shy I am equally thinking about myself. In both cases the mirror of myself is the prominent thing. What will break the mirror? A larger environment. Why are traveled people so nice? It is because they are so natural. And why are they so natural? It is because their eyes have rested on a wider sphere. They have forgot their own greatness; they have forgot their own humility; they have forgot to think about themselves at all - they have smashed their mirror.
       So shall it be with thee, my soul, if thou wilt let Christ in. Thou shalt become for the first time perfectly natural. Thou shalt be a traveled man - the most traveled of all men. Before thee shall stretch the general assembly of the firstborn - the biggest scene in the universe. The things around thee shall lose their importance either as a cross or as a crown. Thou shalt forget to be proud, thou shalt forget to be humble. There shall come to thee a larger love, which shall destroy both vaunting and shrinking. Perfect health neither says '' I am sick "nor" I am well; " it is unconsciousness of its own breathing. So shall it be with thee when Christ shall enter in. Thou shalt become spontaneous, natural, free. Thine shall be the singing of the brook, the warbling of the bird, the kindling of the flower. There shall be no pausing for effect, no posing for attitudes, no angling for favor, no trying to seem. No more shalt thou study the right thing to say; it shall be given thee in the moment - love's moment. Thy goodness shall be grace - something native to thy life. Thy kindness shall be instinctive - born in thy blood. Thy sacrifice shall be unconscious - part of thy being. Thy service shall be easy - an expression of thine own heart. It is sin that has made thee unnatural; thou shalt be a child of nature again when thou hast let Christ in.