Spots [R.., hidden rocks] in your feasts of charity.
Unsuspected dangers
Hidden rocks are the seamen’s worst dangers, and they generally prove the most fatal. They account for the disappearance of many a gallant barque and brave crew. They are not laid down on the chart.
I. The unsuspected dangers which wreck Christian Churches. The apostle means that there were men who, instead of keeping the unity and peace of the Christian community, were the means of wrecking both. The kind of men they are is described in Jud_1:4.
1. They have crept into the Church surreptitiously, not being possessed of the spiritual qualifications they professed to have.
2. They perverted the gospel to evil ends. “They turned the grace of our God unto lasciviousness.” They divorced religion from good morals and good life.
3. There was denial of essential Christian doctrine. “Denying our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”
II. The unsuspected perils of individual spiritual history. “Hidden rocks.”
1. “Nobody will know.” The possibility of secret sin is one of the grave perils of youth and inexperience.
2. “Only this once.” The tempter has never had a more successful plea to urge upon the unwary. But if for once, why not for always?
3. “It is not necessary to be so very particular.” But thoroughness is one great element of safety.
4. “Never mind, another time will do as well.” This is perhaps the most fatal of all. Procrastination of duties means the giving up of duties. Secret unfaithfulness becomes open apostacy. (W. H. Davison.)
“Hidden rocks in your love-feasts”
(R.V.):--The love-feast symbolised the brotherhood of Christians. It was a simple meal, in which all met as equals, and the rich supplied the necessities of the poor. It would seem as if these profligates--
(1) brought with them luxurious food, thus destroying the Christian simplicity of the meal; and
(2) brought this not for the benefit of all, but for their own private enjoyment, thus destroying the idea of Christian brotherhood and equality. The whole purpose of the love-feast was wrecked by these men. They were rocks in them. (A. Plummer, D. D.)
Feeding themselves without fear.
Eucharistic feeding without fear
May not these words be applied to the Eucharistic feeding of those who come to the most holy feast without searching of heart, without self-examination, trusting in their respectability, their apparent blamelessness in respect of gross sin and such things? (M. F. Sadler, M. A.)
Clouds they are without water.--
Disappointing men
These men are ostentatious, but they do no good. It was perhaps expected that their admission to the Church would be a fresh gain to Christendom; but they are as disappointing as clouds that are carried past (
ðáñáöåñṍåíáé
)by winds without giving any rain: and in the East that is one of the most grievous among common disappointments. (A. Plummer, D. D.)
Clouds without water
It pleaseth the Spirit of God in many places of the Old Testament to compare prophets and teachers unto clouds, and their doctrine unto the dropping and distilling of the rain and sweet showers. So the Prophet Ezekiel is commanded to set his face towards the way of Teman, and “drop his word toward the south,” and his prophecy towards the forest. My doctrine shall “drop as the rain,” and my speech shall “distil as the dew, as the shower upon the herbs, and as the great rain upon the grass” (Deu_32:2). The word translated “prophecy” (Mic_2:7; Mic_2:11) signifieth properly to drop or distil. The reason of which comparison is rendered. Because as the rain falleth upon the earth and returneth not in vain, but moisteneth it, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to him that eateth (Isa_55:10-11); so the word in the mouth of the ministers returneth not void, but accomplisheth the Lord’s will. The words then standing upon this similitude bear this sense: Though the property and use of clouds is to carry water and rain for the use of the earth, yet some clouds are without water; even so, though all teachers ought to be filled and fitted with store of wholesome doctrine, to pour it out for the use of the Church, yet these seducers are utterly destitute thereof. And, again, as those clouds without water are light, and fit for nothing than to be carried about with wind, so these are altogether variable and unconstant, carried about with every blast of strange doctrine. The former of these similitudes condemneth their sin of barrenness and unfruitfulness; the latter their sin of inconstancy and variableness. (W. Perkins.)
Trees whose fruit withereth.--
Spiritual withering
1. Even corrupt trees bear some fruit, though but withered. Most men go to hell in the way of religious appearances (Mat_7:22-23).
2. Withering and decaying in holiness is a distemper very unsuitable, and should be very hateful to every Christian.
(1) In respect of God. Decays in our Christian course oppose His nature, in whom is no shadow of change.
(2) In respect of ourselves.
(a) Whatever professions have been made, it is certain there never was sincerity.
(b) Spiritual withering renders all former profession unprofitable and in vain.
(c) Spiritual withering makes our former profession and progress therein to injure us.
(3) In respect of others.
(a) They who remain strong and stable are much distressed by the decay of any.
(b) The weak are much endangered to be carried away with others for company.
(c) The wicked are confirmed in the sin into which the decayed Christian is fallen, and also much deride and reproach that way of truth and holiness which the unsteadfast have forsaken.
3. It is the duty of Christians to endeavour after spiritual fruitfulness (Mat_3:8; Luk_3:8; 2Co_9:10; Php_1:11; Jam_3:17; Joh_15:2; Joh_15:5; Joh_15:16; Col_1:10).
4. The greatest flourishes and appearances of hypocrisy cannot reach the excellency of the least dram of sincerity. All a hypocrite can do amounts not to fruit.
5. Incorrigibleness in sin is a dismal condition. It is a woe to have a bad heart, but it is the depth of woe to have a heart that shall never be better.
6. It is our greatest wisdom, and ought to be our chiefest care, to be preserved from apostacy. To this end--
(1) Be sure to have the truth of spiritual life in you.
(2) Forecast the worst that can befall you.
(3) Take heed of the smallest decay, a beginning to remit of thy holiness.
7. God at length discovers unsound, empty, and decaying Christians to be what they are. (W. Jenkyn, M. A.)
Fruit withering
I.Whatis backsliding? It is not everything that morbid conscientiousness may sometimes mistake for it.
1. It is not the loss of the first gushing emotions of early youth or even of early Christian life.
2. Nor is it the occasional loss of enjoyment or even of peace. The vessel may be going forward, even in a fog, and though “neither sun nor stars” appear, may be still obeying her helm and speeding to port.
3. Temptation, again, is not backsliding. This is one of our present tests. It is the furnace, but because the gold is in the crucible it does not follow there is alloy. No; backsliding is a loss, not of buoyant feeling, or of joy merely, or of freedom from assault, but of spiritual life and power; not of the adjuncts of this life, but of itself. When the eye loses its lustre, the cheek its bloom, the form its roundness, it is from a loss of vitality. The outward indications are but symptomatic, the failure is within. Backsliding is a loss of spiritual life, which, of course, affects the whole circle of spiritual experience, spiritual duties, spiritual influences, and in all senses makes the fruit to wither. Is it not, as thus understood, a most wretched state? It is foolish. What fools we are to lose such a condition as our former one, and to lapse into this; to leave the Father’s house, with its abundance of provision and love, and to feed on “ashes” and “husks.” How ungrateful, too. Think what has been done for us by the all-loving Saviour; in us, by His gracious Spirit. How opposed to the genius of the gospel, too! Christianity intends growth, advancement in each grace, in the entire Christian life, and this in order to perfection. We have perversely been realising just the opposite; crab-like, have gone backward instead of forward.
II. What is the cause of backsliding? The cause may be one of many, or all combined.
1. It may be that the tree itself is bad. Its surroundings favourable, it may yet fail from inherent defect. I need not say that this is the main cause with us. Alas! we are degenerate trees of a tainted stock. Sin, that destroyer of all good, dwells in us. “The heart is deceitful and desperately wicked.” The stock itself is tainted, the “tree corrupt,” and no wonder it fails to mature “good fruit.” But has it not been engrafted? It has, but the old nature is not eradicated. Subdued, striven against, wrestled with, it yet exists, and is the cause, the first great cause, of all the knots, excrescences, and withered fruit which mar the beauty of the tree.
2. Not only may the tree be bad, its soil may be defective. As the tree literally, so we spiritually, draw our sap from without. It has been the defect of this vital influence that has been another cause of our failure. Had it been supplied, drawn through, the appointed medium, as it might and ought, it would have vanquished the noxious elements already existing, and produced vigour and health. And why has not this been done? Partly, perhaps, from a defect in our original training. Rejoicing in our new experience, one of glowing delight, “first love,” we lived on day by day, sustained simply by emotion. This, then, seemed to suffice, for the well was deep. By a beneficent law of nature, however, it is ordained that strong emotion shall be but temporary, that intense heat shall evaporate into steam. When this ceased, we were at fault. We have learnt since that “our life is hid with Christ in God,” that “He is our life,” and is unchangeable and perennial. We may have failed to avail ourselves subsequently even of this, but at first we did not adequately know it.
3. Another cause of withering may be the surrounding atmosphere. How subtle this is, and how insidiously and yet injuriously it acts upon the growing trees. There is an atmosphere about us all spiritually, formed by our domestic and social position--the books we read, places we frequent, society we form, ministry we attend, and a thousand other things in our daily lives. This may be helpful; it may also be the reverse.
4. Besides this habitual atmosphere, there are also blights--states of the atmosphere when it is more fully than usual charged with poisonous influences or parasitic life. Prevailing tones of fashion and dress, sinful indulgence, habits of excess, sudden prosperity, worldly alliance, lax sense of obligation--how these sometimes come over the promising tree, and in a night or day destroy its beauty, cover it with deformity, wither its fruit!
5. Another cause of decay is lack of appropriate means. The tree needs not only a sound stock, good soil and atmosphere, but also proper attention. Digging, manure, water, pruning, are all requisite, and without these it will suffer, at length decay. That God works by means we know, and this in our best estate we practically recognised. How diligently these were plied at first. The Bible was our joy, and we had it “in our heart,” that we might not sin against God. Prayer, too, what a reality it was! The Sabbath, how we loved it! And the sanctuary, it was truly Bethel, God’s house. All these, and kindred ones, were means of spiritual culture to us. If these, any or all of them, have been neglected by us, come to be duties rather than privileges--no wonder that we have become withered, and that our fruit has decayed.
6. Fruit may wither because it is not used at the appropriate time. One reason why spiritual life in our Churches is so feeble and sickly a principle is because it lacks exercise. The backsliding Christian is ordinarily to be found amongst the “slothful and unprofitable servants.”
III. What is the remedy?
1. Return.
2. Repent.
3. Resolve--to watch, pray, be diligent, advance. (D. J. Vincy.)
Twice dead.--
“Twice dead”
Dean Alford refers to the double death in a tree, which is not only as it seems to the eye in common with other trees, in the apparent death of winter, but really dead; dead to appearance, and dead in reality.
