The metaphor represents to us the action of one who, possessing some valuable thing, puts it into some safe place, takes great care of it, carries it very near to the heart, perhaps within the robe, and watches tenderly and jealously over it. So thou hast kept the word of My patience.'
There are two ways by which Christians are to do that; the one is by inwardly cherishing the word, and the other by outwardly obeying it. There should be both the inward counting it dear and precious, and treasuring it in mind and heart, as the Psalmist says, Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I should not offend against Thee,' and also the regulation of conduct which we more usually regard as keeping the commandment.
Let me say a word, and it shall only be a word, about each of these two things. I am afraid that the plain practical duty of reading their Bibles is getting to be a much neglected duty amongst professing Christian people. I do not know how you are to keep the words of Christ's patience in your hearts and minds if you do not read them. I am afraid that most Christian congregations nowadays do their systematic and prayerful study of the New Testament by proxy, and expect their ministers to read the Bible for them and to tell them what is there. A mother will sometimes take a morsel of her child's food into her mouth, and half masticate it first before she passes it to the little gums. I am afraid that newspapers, and circulating libraries, and magazines, and little religious books--very good in their way, but secondary and subordinate--have taken the place that our fathers used to have filled by honest reading of God's Word. And that is one of the reasons, and I believe it is a very large part of the reason, why so many professing Christians do not come up to this standard; and instead of running with patience the race that is set before them,' walk in an extraordinarily leisurely fashion, by fits and starts, and sometimes with long intervals, in which they sit still on the road, and are not a mile farther at a year's end than they were when it began. There never was, and there never will be, vigorous Christian life unless there be an honest and habitual study of God's Word. There is no short-cut by which Christians can reach the end of the race. Foremost among the methods by which their eyes are enlightened and their hearts rejoiced are application to the eyes of their understanding of that eye-salve, and the hiding in their hearts of that sweet solace and fountain of gladness, the Word of Christ's patience, the revelation of God's will. The trees whose roots are laved and branches freshened by that river have leaves that never wither, and all their blossoms set.
But the word is kept by continual obedience in action as well as by inward treasuring. Obviously the inward must precede the outward. Unless we can say with the Psalmist, Thy word have I hid in my heart,' we shall not be able to say with him, I have not hid Thy righteousness within my heart.' If the Word of the Lord is to sound like a rousing trumpet-blast from our lives, it must first be heard in secret by us, and its music linger in our listening hearts.
We need this brave persistence in daily life if we are not to fail wholly. Very instructive in this aspect are many of the Scripture allusions to patience' as essential to the various virtues and blessednesses of Christian life.
For example, In your patience ye shall win your souls.' Only he who presses right on, in spite of all that externals can do to hinder him from realising his conviction of duty, is the lord of his own spirit. All others are slaves to something or some one. By persistence in the paths of Christian service, no matter what around or within us may rise up to hinder us, and by such persistence only, do we become masters of ourselves. Many a man has to walk, as in the old days of ordeal by fire, over a road strewn with hot ploughshares, to get to the place where God will have him to be. And if he does not flinch, though he may reach the goal with scorched feet, he will reach it with a quiet heart, and possess himself, whatever he may lose.
Again, the Lord Himself says to us, These are those which bring forth fruit with patience.' There is no growth of Christian character, no flowering of Christian conduct, no setting of incipient virtues into the mature fruit of settled habit, without this persistent adherence in the face of all antagonism, to the dictates of conscience and the commandment of Christ. It is the condition of bringing forth fruit, some thirty, some sixty, and some a hundredfold.
Again the Scripture says, demanding this same persistence, gentle abstinence, and sanctified stiffnecked-ness, Run with perseverance the race that is set before you.' There is no progress in the Christian course, no accomplishing the stadiathrough which we have to pass, except there be this dogged keeping at what we know to be duty, in spite of all the reluctance of trembling limbs, and the cowardice of our poor hearts.
