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I. We may begin by defining what we mean by "Indifference." Now there are always two great periods of difficulty in the history of individual religious belief. The first is the difficulty of accepting a new faith. The greatness of St. Paul's conversion lies here, that it was the turning not of a bad man into a good, but of a sincere bigot from the faith in which he had been nurtured to a faith which he had despised. But there is a second trial belonging to more quiet times. If they who have inherited a settled form of religion are spared much which probes those whose lot it is to have a new creed proposed to them, they have a different danger of their own to face — the danger of holding loosely what they have been familiar with from childhood. Persons belong to the Christian Church by birth, by compliance with certain external usages, but the subject-matter inspires them with little interest. Their religion is unto them a matter of propriety, an element of the social system, but it does not stir the depths of their nature. But now, why may not a man whose tastes so incline him preserve as it were this state of neutrality, without taking any part in the conflicts of thought around him, or the struggles of the kingdom to overcome the ignorance and the sin of the world? It might be answered that a perfect neutrality amid conflicting principles and practices is almost an impossibility. "Indifference" is generally the result of one of two causes — pride of intellect or mental sloth. But the noblest argument against "Indifference," is that indicated in the text. "I have not found thy part fulfilled before God." In those solemn words, as they thrill across the border-line between eternity and time, I seem to hear of a part assigned to every individual, not to accomplish which to the full is a disappointing the very end of our creation. How vast soever be the Divine plan, whatever circles of the universe it may embrace, your life and mine has been knit up therewith. Every child born into the world is designed to contribute to the evolution of the purposes of the everlasting will. And this holds good more especially of religion. There is nothing more remarkable than the manner in which, in all that concerns God's revelation. man has been assumed as a fellow-worker with God. As in the great fundamental truth, the Incarnation, so in every after detail of the eternal plan, the everlasting decree changed not, that the work of religion in the world must be accomplished by and through man. And similarly with the Church of Christ; we may almost trace in its history the part allotted by God to each generation. It was the task of the early Church to lie hid, like leaven, in the midst of this polluted mass, breathing into the dry bones of this dead civilisation a new and healthier life. It has not perhaps been adequately noted how the existence of the Roman empire was protracted by the fresh vigour which Christianity was secretly throwing into the worn-out system. And now a new work was to be done in God's world. There is no more wonderful chapter of man's history than that which records how tribe after tribe poured down from the north, and upon every one as it drew near, while civil institutions crumbled before them, the Church of the living God laid its hand and moulded out of their fierceness a second and more vigorous civilisation. May we venture to indicate the work which seems allotted to ourselves? It is impossible not to observe two special features of our own age, the concentration of the population in a few centres of industry, and the general diffusion of knowledge. Both these bring with them their' trials; both oppose, each its own hindrance to faith and good living. When these obstacles are mastered, and the truth of God has won yet another triumph over what is now, as every trial once was, an unknown difficulty, doubtless some other form of evil will present itself until the victory of the Son of Man is complete. But now, if every generation be thus indeed God's appointed agency for winning some fresh triumph for Him, if we are a link in that chain which connects the beginning with the end, what an argument is here against that cold philosophic indifference in which so many stand aside from the work of God in their day. Shalt I hold in my hand an instrument imparted by my Creator, and not use it to the utmost?

II. BUT SECONDLY, "INDIFFERENCE" IS THE CONSEQUENCE AND PROOF OF AN IMPERFECT CULTIVATION OF THE INDIVIDUAL MIND AND CHARACTER. God has implanted in us two sets of faculties, those by which we deal with our present existence, and those by which we apprehend things unseen. Reason, prudence, foresight — these are the endowments which qualify us to act upon this world. But there are other endowments vouchsafed unto man. To him alone, of all that walks the earth, is given the power of looking beyond the earth. The one grand note of difference between man and the beasts lies in the simple power to utter the familiar words, "I believe in God." And this high gift carries with it a variety of gifts. It is the Divine ordination which sets the whole race apart as the priests of creation. The direction and exercise of these spiritual instincts, neither on the one hand to allow them to degenerate into bigotry and superstition, nor on the other hand to let them, as we may let them, die out of the soul, is perhaps the loftiest task which God has set us. The man who cultivates only those faculties which are called into play by the affairs of this life cultivates only half of his being. And hence another characteristic of "indifference." To stand aloof from the questions which have to do more immediately with the revelation of God, to have an acute interest in all except the truths, the worship, the progress, the influence of the Church of Christ, is to present the sure marks of an imperfect manhood, to evidence a one-sided development of the powers of the soul. We will not speak now of the selfishness of the attempt to isolate ourselves from the struggles of our contemporaries, to withdraw from the warfare of God, filling up the vacancy of the mind and the life with a thousand self-chosen imaginations and pursuits. It is to the secret world of the human soul that we would now carry down your gaze, and aa you gather in the mightiness of its organisation and walk through the chambers of its imagery, summing up all the powers with which its Maker hath equipped it, we bid you note how in the case of the man who lives on in indifference, one portion of the stately fabric lies hopelessly in ruins; how the part that is strongest, is in close contact with that which is weak; how around the well-wrought halls of thought, memory, reason, imagination, lie in disjointed fragments the kindred gifts of reverence, and love, and self-sacrifice, and faith, uncared for and unbuilt up, and so whatever admiration among men the exhibiting some rare mental faculty may procure, the man's part, when set in the light of God's countenance, is seen to be but half performed, the work imperfect before the Lord.

(Bp. Woodford.)

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KJV: Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die: for I have not found thy works perfect before God.

WEB: Wake up, and keep the things that remain, which you were about to throw away, for I have found no works of yours perfected before my God.