Notes of a Stirring Sermon Preached Several Tears Ago a Scotchman REV. JO H N M A C NEIL
Daniel wasn’t a monk shut up in a monastery. He was a man, a great statesman filled with political cares. Three-fourths of a tree is what is above the ground. But you wouldn’t have all this bulk and beaufy but for the narrow unsightly root beneath, the other quarter. What the root is to the tree creed is to conduct. It’s non sense to say that it is no matter what one believes if the life is only right. The fruit of your life depends on the creed in which it is rooted. Daniel got into trouble through re ligion. He had no desire to get into trouble either. He wanted to do his duty the best he could for his imperial master—above all under God. He found himself in peril of his life. He wasn’t courting notoriety or persecu tion. If you are as faithful a Christian .as Daniel, you’ll get into trouble too. If you’ve landed on a profession of re ligion that doesn’t bring you into trouble, you’d better look rather nar rowly at your religion lest the devil has palmed off a counterfeit on you. Get Daniel’s brand. Beware of all spurious imitations. Notice that Daniel’s reli gion got him in and his religion also got him out and when he was out it left him nearer to God. Now there are lots of church people in just that place. You go to church and hear the truth on Sunday and God tries you through the Week. Some wal low through and some turn tail and go back. There’s no road to heaven by going back. Nothing can stop you if you’ll just pray and trust like Daniel did.
Dan. 6:10: “Now w hen D aniel knew th a t th e w ritin g w as signed, he w en t in to his house; an d his w indow s b ein g open in h is ch am b er to w a rd Je ru sa lem , he kneeled upon his knees th re e 'tim e s a day, and prayed, a n d gave th a n k s before his God, a s he did afo re tim e .”
HIS is the key verse round which the story of Daniel ¡turns. His enemies were moved by jealousy and were determined to put Daniel out of his high political position. They couldn’t pick a flaw in his political life, so they
leveled at his religion. They knew about his praying habits. They pro posed that for thirty days, if any man pray except to ¡the king, he should be cast into the lions’ den. What an illustration of constancy in religion—adherence to Biblical con scientious convictions. Our religion isn’t a thing to be slipped off like an old slip. It is a life or it is nothing. Matthew Arnold said, “Conduct is three-fourths of life.” I rather think he made that statement at the expense of creeds. The statement is incomplete altogether. Three-fourths of a thing is not the whole of it. If I owed Mat thew Arnold an account, and offered him three-fourths of it in payment, I am certain he would have gently re minded me of the other quarter just to logically round the thing out. Dear friends, your real life is rooted in a creed. That creed should be a living faith in a living God—which above all things manifests itself in daily prayer. The greatest test of faith down to the ground as to creed is Daniel’s habit of personal speaking to God.
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