Colossians 3:12

THE CHRISTIAN’S VESTURE

‘Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering.’

Colossians 3:12

But notice, to start with, how St. Paul, even before he says what we should be, reminds us of what we are. ‘Put on,’ he begins; but before he describes the Christian vesture he is insistent on the right view of the Christian’s essential status and position.

I. The Christian’s status and appeal.—‘As the elect of God, holy and beloved,’ chosen, consecrated, the objects of God’s love. It is because you are all this that you are bidden to clothe yourselves with the suitable garb of Christian perfection. What you have to wear is the result of what by grace you are. It is just what St. Paul always does. He constantly appeals to men, not simply as men, but as something more. He beseeches them by the mercies of God; he calls upon them as men on whom God’s choice has rested, on whom God has laid the hands of consecration, as men who have realised and experienced and owned the solemn and blessed reality of the Divine love.

II. This is no unreal or sentimental appeal.—It is not, for example, a bit of mere rhetoric. It is no mere bit of pleasant and ingratiating courtesy. It is sound and solid, and meant to bear the whole weight of a real and urgent appeal. I ask you to do this because I know, and you know too, where you stand; you are men whom God has chosen, whom God, in a very real sense, has claimed and set apart for His own use and His own work, whom God has really loved; that is why you must put on ‘the heart of compassion,’ and ‘kindness, and humility, and meekness, and, above all, love.’ Christian motive alone will stir to Christian action. That is the method of St. Paul. How far is it the method, the appeal, of the present day? Do we, as a matter of fact, appeal to people in that way?

III. The Christian’s vesture.—The text describes it.

(a) The heart of compassion. What does it mean for you and me? It means at least that genuine tender-heartedness is a real part of the Christian character. There is an appalling amount of real misery and suffering in the world. It is not far away from us; it lies at our very doors. It presents, it may be, problems and difficulties which demand most careful consideration if they are ever to be solved. But quite apart from any theory as to their solution, there is the grave question of the state of our own hearts with regard to it. There are men and women—we cannot doubt it—so selfish that, until suffering actually comes to their own doors and darkens their own lives, care little about it. They are the Dives of the present day, quite content that they should have their good things and Lazarus his evil things. Compassion seems to them a sort of softness, a thing for women rather than men. They are not moved, they do not want to be moved, by the sufferings and the hardships of their fellow-creatures. They own no responsibility with regard to it, no call to self-denial.

(b) Kindness and humility. These come next in the beautiful order of the graces which the Christian is to put on. The one, of course, rules our behaviour to others; the second concerns our estimate of ourselves.

(c) Meekness and long-suffering. ‘Learn of Me,’ says our Lord, ‘for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.’ The temper that makes a man content to be little esteemed, little considered: what rest and peace it brings. How easy it is to talk of it. How hard it is to maintain. Yet it is something even to desire it, even to aim at it.

Bishop H. L. Paget.

Illustration

‘A district visitor called upon a debased woman whom none had been able to tame. She entered the miserable apartment and saw the woman lying in a corner as if a bundle of rags. She spoke, and an old, withered, miserable-looking creature raised herself upon her elbow and with frenzied look demanded what she wanted. She replied, “I love you; I want to be kind to you, because Jesus loves you.” She went forward and kissed her brow, and notwithstanding violent, repelling words, kissed her again. Then came the exclamation, “Go away, go away! you will break my heart. You put me in mind of my mother. Never has any one kissed me as she did; never have I been so treated since I lost her: many kicks and blows have I had, but no kisses like this.” The fountain of feeling was opened, the confidence of the heart was won, and step by step that all but utterly lost soul was led back to Jesus.’