Psalm 72:17 His name shall endure for ever: his name shall be continued as long as the sun: and men shall be blessed in him… I. THE MORAL AND SOCIAL BENEFIT. We need to take the simplest, plainest facts that lie upon the surface of history, to see what a revelation was implied in the entrance of Christian ideas into such a world as this. It brought, for one thing, a totally new idea of man himself, as a being of infinite dignity and immortal worth; it taught that every man's soul, even the humblest, poorest, and the most defiled, was made in God's image, is capable of eternal life, and has an infinite value — a value that made worth while God's own Son's dying to redeem it. It brought back to men's minds the sense of responsibility to God — an idea that had never been possessed, or had been altogether or almost altogether lost. It brought into the world a new spirit of love and charity, something wonderful in the eyes of those heathen as they saw institutions spring up round about them that they had never thought or heard of in heathenism before. It flashed into men's souls a new moral ideal, and set up a standard of truth, and integrity, and purity, which has acted as an elevating force on moral conception in the world till this hour. It restored woman to her rightful place by man's side as his spiritual helpmate and equal, and created that best of God's blessings on earth, the Christian home, where children are reared in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. It taught the slave his spiritual freedom as a member of the Kingdom of God, gave him a place there in Christ's kingdom as an equal with his own master, and struck at the foundations of slavery by its doctrine of the natural brotherhood and the dignity of man. It created self-respect, a sense of duty in the use of one's powers for self-support and for the benefit of others. It urged to honest labour. "Let him that stole steal no more," etc. And in a myriad ways, by direct teaching, by the protest of holy lives, by its gentle spirit, it struck at the evils and the corruptions and the malpractices and the cruelties of the time. II. THE RELIGIOUS DEBT TO JESUS. It was Christianity that overthrew the reign of those gods and goddesses of Greece and Rome, and swept them so completely from the path of history that no one, even in his wildest imagination, now dreams of the possibility of their revival. It was Christianity that, still maintaining something of its youthful energy, laid hold of these rough barbarian people in the Middle Ages and trained them to some kind of civilization and moral life. It was Christianity that in England and Scotland lighted the light that by and by spread its radiance through every part of the country. It is Christianity that to-day is teaching the nations to burn their idols, to cease their horrid practices, to take on them the obligations of moral and civilized existence. Whatever blessings or hopes we trace to our religion, whatever light it imparts to our minds or cheer to cur hearts, whatever power there is in it to sustain holiness or conquer sin, all that we owe to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. III. THE ETERNAL BENEFITS. "Jesus hath abolished death," we read, "and hath brought life and immortality to light through His Gospel." And what was better, He not only taught men the way of life, but stood there Himself, the great medium of return to God. He stood there not only teaching men what the way of life was, but He Himself was there to place their feet in its paths. He not only taught us about God, but showed us how to be at peace with Him — brought us back to God, from whom we had wandered, and reconciled us with God. He not only warned us of the dangers and the evils of the life of sin, of the ruin, the destruction which sin brought with it, of the alienation, the estrangement from the life of God that was in sin; but He united Himself there with us, with His infinite mercy in our lone, and lost, and condemned condition, took upon Himself there, on His own soul, that burden we could not for ourselves bear, and through His cross and passion opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers. (James Orr, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: His name shall endure for ever: his name shall be continued as long as the sun: and men shall be blessed in him: all nations shall call him blessed. |
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