Night Office Vigils
At the Second Reading, the first line from J. H. Newman gave the theme, 'sincere and insincere'.
The antithesis gave an illuminating insight but then left me adrift with Newman's not too clear the alternatives. Then also the Reading left gaps.
It is still all the more demanding for the whole Sermon, to make up from brief 505 words to the Sermon of 4,275 words.
It will be the best occasion to learn the real sense of John Henry Newman's homiletic genius.
http://www.newmanreader.org/works/parochial/volume5/sermon16.html
Newman P&P Vol 5 Sermon 16. Serm 16. Sincerity and Hypocrisy 
"If there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not." 2 Cor. viii. 12.Great, then, is the difference between sincere and insincere Christians, however like their words may be to each other; and it is needless to say, that what I have shown in a few examples, might be instanced again and again from every part of Scripture, particularly from the history of the Jews, as contained in the Prophets. All men, even after the gift of God's grace, sin: God's true servants profess and sin,—sin, and are sorry; and hypocrites profess and sin,—sin and are sorry.
Thus the two parties look like each other.
But the word of God discriminates one from the other by this test,
—that Christ dwells in the conscience of one not of the other;
that the one opens his heart to God, the other does not;
the one views Almighty God only as an accidental guest, the other as Lord and owner of all that he is;
the one admits Him as if for a night, or some stated season, the other gives himself over to God, and considers himself God's servant and instrument now and for ever.
Not more different is the intimacy of friends from mere acquaintance; not more different is it to know a person in society, to be courteous and obliging to him, to interchange civilities, from opening one's heart to another, admitting him into it, seeing into his, loving him, and living in him;
—than the external worship of the hypocrite, from the inward devotion of true faith; approaching God with the lips, from believing on Him with the heart; so opening to the Spirit that He opens to us, from so living to self as to exclude the light of heaven. {235}
Now, as to applying what I have been showing from Scripture to ourselves, this shall here be left, my brethren, to the consciences of each of us, and a few words will suffice to do this. Do you, then, habitually thus unlock your hearts and subject your thoughts to Almighty God? Are you living in this conviction of His Presence, and have you this special witness that that Presence is really set up within you unto your salvation, viz. that you live in the sense of it? Do you believe, and act on the belief, that His light penetrates and shines through your heart, as the sun's beams through a room? You know how things look when the sun's beams are on it,—the very air then appears full of impurities, which, before it came out, were not seen. So is it with our souls.
Let us so {236} own it, as to set Him before us in everything. "I have set God always before me," says the Psalmist, "for He is on my right hand, therefore I shall not fail." [Ps. xvi. 8.] Let us, in all circumstances, thus regard Him. Whether we have sinned, let us not dare keep from Him, but with the prodigal son, rise and go to Him. Or, if we are conscious of nothing, still let us not boast in ourselves or justify ourselves, but feel that "He who judgeth us is the Lord." In all circumstances, of joy or sorrow, hope or fear, let us aim at having Him in our inmost heart; let us have no secret apart from Him. Let us acknowledge Him as enthroned within us at the very springs of thought and affection. Let us submit ourselves to His guidance and sovereign direction; let us come to Him that He may forgive us, cleanse us, change us, guide us, and save us.
This is the true life of saints. This is to have the Spirit witnessing with our spirits that we are sons of God. Such a faith alone will sustain the terrors of the Last Day; such a faith alone will be proof against those fierce flames which are to surround the Judge, when He comes with His holy Angels to separate between "those who serve God, and those who serve Him not." [Mal. iii. 18.]
The colour purple text does not appear from the Sermon above.
Parochial and Plain Sermons, Volume 5John Henry Newman
Revised July, 2001—NR.
Contents
Newman
Parochial and Plain a Vol 5 Serm 16 Sincerity
4,275
words
Sermon 16. Sincerity and Hypocrisy
"If
there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and
not according to that he hath not." 2 Cor. viii. 12.
[Note]
{222} MEN may be divided into two great classes, those who profess
religious obedience, and those who do not; and of those who do profess to be
religious, there are again those who perform as well as profess, and those who
do not. And thus on the whole there are three classes of men in the world, open
sinners, consistent Christians, and between the two, (as speaking with the one,
and more or less acting with the other,) professing Christians, or, as they are
sometimes called, nominal Christians. Now the distinction between open sinners
and consistent Christians is so clear, that there is no mistaking it; for they
agree in nothing; they neither profess the same things nor practise the same.
But the difference between professing Christians and true Christians is not so
clear, for this reason, that true Christians, however consistent {223} they
are, yet do sin, as being not yet perfect; and so far as they sin, are
inconsistent, and this is all that professing Christians are. What then, it may
be asked, is the real difference between true and professing Christians, since
both the one and the other profess more than they practise? Again, if you put
the question to one of the latter class, however inconsistent his life may be,
yet he will be sure to say that he wishes he was better; that he is sorry for
his sins; that the flesh is weak; that he cannot overcome it; that God alone
can overcome it; that he trusts God will, and that he prays to Him to enable
him to do it. There is no form of words conceivable which a mere professing
Christian cannot use,—nay, more, there appears to be no sentiment which he
cannot feel,—as well as the true Christian, and at first sight apparently with
the same justice. He seems just in the very position of the
true Christian, only perhaps behind him; not so consistent,
not advanced so much; still, on the same line. Both confess to a struggle
within them; both sin, both are sorry; what then is the difference between
them?
There
are many differences; but, before going on to mention that one to which I shall
confine my attention, I would have you observe that I am speaking of
differences in God's sight. Of course, we men may after all be unable
altogether, and often are unable, to see differences between those who,
nevertheless, are on different sides of the line of life. Nor may we judge
anything absolutely before the time, whereas God "searcheth the
hearts." He alone, "who searcheth the {224} hearts,"
"knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit." We do not even know
ourselves absolutely. "Yea, I judge not mine own self," says St.
Paul, "but He that judgeth me is the Lord." God alone can unerringly
discern between sincerity and insincerity, between the hypocrite and the man of
perfect heart. I do not, of course, mean that we can form no judgment at all
upon ourselves, or that it is not useful to do so; but here I will chiefly
insist upon the point of doctrine, viz., how does the true
Christian differ in God's sight from the insincere and double-minded?—leaving
any practical application which it admits, to be incidentally brought out in
the course of my remarks.
Now
the real difference between the true and the professing Christian seems to be
given us in the text,—"If there be a willing mind, it is accepted."
St. Paul is speaking of almsgiving; but what he says seems to apply generally.
He is laying down a principle, which applies of course in many distinct cases,
though he uses it with reference to one in particular. An honest, unaffected desire of
doing right is the test of God's true servant. On the other hand, a double
mind, a pursuing other ends besides the truth, and in consequence an
inconsistency in conduct, and a half-consciousness (to say the least) of
inconsistency, and a feeling of the necessity of defending oneself to oneself,
and to God, and to the world; in a word, hypocrisy; these are the signs of the
merely professed Christian. Now I am going to give some instances of this
distinction, in Scripture and in fact.
For
instance. The two great Christian graces are {225} faith and love. Now, how are
these characterised in Scripture?—By their being honest or single-minded. Thus
St. Paul, in one place, speaks of "the end of the commandment being
love;" what love?—"love out of a pure heart," he
proceeds, "and of a good conscience;" and still further,
"and of faith,"—what kind of faith?—"faith unfeigned;"
or, as it may be more literally translated, "unhypocritical faith;"
for so the word means in Greek. Again, elsewhere he speaks of his "calling
to remembrance the unfeigned faith" which dwelt in
Timothy, and in his mother and grandmother before him; that is, literally,
"unhypocritical faith." Again, he speaks of the Apostles approving
themselves as the ministers of God, "by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by
love unfeigned," or, more literally, "unhypocritical
love." Again, as to love towards man. "Let love be without
dissimulation," or, more literally, as in the other cases, "let
love be unhypocritical." In like manner, St. Peter speaks of Christians
"having purified their souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto
unhypocritical love of the brethren." And in like manner, St. James speaks
of "the wisdom that is from above, being first pure ..."
and, presently, "without partiality, and without hypocrisy."
[2 Cor. vi. 6. Rom. xii. 9. 1 Pet. i. 22. James iii. 17.] Surely it is very
remarkable that three Apostles, writing on different subjects and occasions,
should each of them thus speak about whether faith or love as without
hypocrisy.
A
true Christian, then, may almost be defined as one who has a ruling sense of
God's presence within him. As none but justified persons have that privilege,
so {226} none but the justified have that practical perception of it. A true
Christian, or one who is in a state of acceptance with God, is he, who, in such
sense, has faith in Him, as to live in the thought that He is present with
him,—present not externally, not in nature merely, or in providence, but in his
innermost heart, or in his conscience. A man is justified whose
conscience is illuminated by God, so that he habitually realizes that all his
thoughts, all the first springs of his moral life, all his motives and his
wishes, are open to Almighty God. Not as if he was not aware that there is very
much in him impure and corrupt, but he wishes that all that is in him should be
bare to God. He believes that it is so, and he even joys to think that it is
so, in spite of his fear and shame at its being so. He alone admits Christ into
the shrine of his heart; whereas others wish in some way or other, to be by
themselves, to have a home, a chamber, a tribunal, a throne, a self where God
is not,—a home within them which is not a temple, a chamber which is not a
confessional, a tribunal without a judge, a throne without a king;—that self
may be king and judge; and that the Creator may rather be dealt with and
approached as though a second party, instead of His being that true and better
self of which self itself should be but an instrument and minister.
Scripture
tells us that God the Word, who died for us and rose again, and now lives for
us, and saves us, is "quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged
sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the
joints and marrow, and a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Neither is there {227} any creature that is not manifest in His sight; but all
things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do."
[Heb. iv. 12, 13.] Now the true Christian realizes this; and what is the
consequence?—Why, that he enthrones the Son of God in his conscience, refers to
Him as a sovereign authority, and uses no reasoning with Him. He does not
reason, but he says, "Thou, God, seest me." He feels that God is too
near him to allow of argument, self-defence, excuse, or objection. He appeals
in matters of duty, not to his own reason, but to God Himself whom with the
eyes of faith he sees, and whom he makes the Judge; not to any fancied fitness,
or any preconceived notion, or any abstract principle, or any tangible
experience.
The
Book of Psalms continually instances this temper of profound, simple,
open-hearted confidence in God. "O Lord, Thou hast searched me out and
known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising. Thou understandest my
thoughts long before ... There is not a word in my tongue but Thou knowest it
altogether." "My soul hangeth upon Thee. Thy right hand hath upholden
me." "When I wake up, I am present with Thee." "Into Thy
hands I commend my spirit, for Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, Thou God of
Truth." "Commit thy way unto the Lord, and put thy trust in Him, and
He shall bring it to pass. He shall make thy righteousness as clear as the
light, and thy just dealing as the noonday." "Against Thee only have
I sinned, and done this evil in Thy sight." "Hear the right, O Lord,
consider my complaint, and hearken {228} unto my prayer that goeth not out of
feigned lips. Let my sentence come forth from Thy presence, and let Thine eyes
look upon the thing that is equal. Thou hast proved and visited mine heart in
the night season. Thou hast tried me, and shalt find no wickedness in me; for I
am utterly purposed that my mouth shall not offend." Once more, "Thou
shalt guide me with Thy counsel, and after that receive me with glory. Whom
have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire in
comparison of Thee. My flesh and my heart faileth, but God is the strength of
mine heart and my portion for ever." [Ps. cxxxix. 1, 2, 4; lxiii. 8; xxxi.
5; xxxvii. 5, 6; li. 4; xvii. 1-3; lxxiii. 24-26.]
Or,
again, consider the following passage in St. John's First Epistle. "If our
heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things.
Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God."
And in connexion with this, the following from the same Epistle: "God is
Light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with
Him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth ... If we confess our
sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from
all unrighteousness." Again, "the darkness is past, and the true
light now shineth." Again, "Hereby we know that He abideth in us, by
the Spirit which He hath given us." And again, "He that believeth on
the Son of God, hath the witness in himself." And, in the same connexion,
consider St. Paul's statement, that "the {229} Spirit itself beareth
witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God." [1 John iii.
20, 21; i. 5-9; ii. 8; iii. 24; v. 10. Rom. viii. 16.]
And,
now, on the other hand, let us contrast such a temper of mind, which loves to
walk in the light, with that of the merely professing Christian, or, in
Scripture language, of thehypocrite. Such are they who have two ends
which they pursue, religion and the world; and hence St. James
calls them "double-minded." Hence, too, our Lord, speaking of the
Pharisees who were hypocrites, says, "Ye cannot serve God and mammon."
[Luke xvi. 13.] A double-minded man, then, as having two ends in view, dare not
come to God, lest he should be discovered; for "all things that are
reproved are made manifest by the light." [Ephes. v. 13.] Thus, whereas
the Prodigal Son "rose and came to his father," on the contrary, Adam
hid himself among the trees of the garden. It was not simple dread of God, but
dread joined to an unwillingness to be restored to God. He had a secret in his
heart which he kept from God. He felt towards God,—as it would seem, or at
least his descendants so feel,—as one man often feels towards another in the
intercourse of life. You sometimes say of a man, "he is friendly, or
courteous, or respectful, or considerate, or communicative; but, after all,
there is something, perhaps without his knowing it, in the background. He
professes to be agreed with me; he almost displays his agreement; he says he
pursues the same objects as I; but still I do not know him, I do not make
progress with him, I have no confidence in him, I {230} do not know him better
than the first time I saw him." Such is the way in which the double-minded
approach the Most High,—they have a something private, a hidden self at bottom.
They look on themselves, as it were, as independent parties, treating with
Almighty God as one of their fellows. Hence, so far from seeking God, they
hardly like to be sought by Him. They would rather keep their position and
stand where they are,—on earth, and so make terms with God in heaven; whereas,
"he that doeth truth, cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made
manifest that they are wrought in God." [John iii. 21.]
This
being the case, there being in the estimation of the double-minded man two
parties, God and self, it follows (as I have said), that reasoning and argument
is the mode in which he approaches his Saviour and Judge; and that for two
reasons,—first, because he will not give himself up to God,
but stands upon his rights and appeals to his notions of fitness: and next,
because he has some secret misgiving after all that he is dishonest, or some
consciousness that he may appear so to others; and therefore, he goes about to
fortify his position, to explain his conduct, or to excuse himself.
Some
such argument or excuse had the unprofitable servant, when called before his
Lord. The other servants said, "Lord, Thy pound hath gained ten," or
"five pounds." They said no more; nothing more was necessary; the
case spoke for itself. But the unprofitable servant did not dare leave his
conduct to tell its own tale at God's judgment-seat; he said not merely,
"Lord, I have kept Thy pound laid up in a napkin:" he {231} appealed,
as it were, to the reasonableness of his conduct against his Maker: he felt he
must make out a case, and he went on to attempt it. He trusted not his
interests to the Eternal and All-perfect Reason of God, before whom he stood,
but entrenched himself in his own.
Again:—When
our Lord said to the scribe, who had answered Him that eternal life was to be
gained by loving God and his neighbour, "Thou hast answered right,"
this ought to have been enough. But his object was not to please God, but to
exalt himself. And, therefore, he went on to make an objection. "But he,
willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my
neighbour?" whereas they only are justified in God's judgment, who give up
the notion of justifying themselves by word or deed, who start with the
confession that they are unjust, and who come to God, not upon their own
merits, but for His mercy.
Again:
we have the same arguing and insincere spirit exposed in the conduct of the
Pharisees, when they asked Christ for the authority on which He acted. They
said, "By what authority doest thou these things?" This might be the
question of sincere inquirers or mere objectors, of faith or of hypocrisy.
Observe how our Lord detects it. He asked them about St. John's baptism;
meaning to say, that if they acknowledged St. John, they must acknowledge
Himself of whom St. John spake. They, unwilling to submit to Christ as a
teacher and Lord, preferred to deny John to going on to acknowledge Him. Yet,
on the other hand, they dare not openly deny the Baptist, because of the
people; so, between hatred of our Lord {232} and dread of the people, they
would give no answer at all. "They reasoned among
themselves," we are told. In consequence, our Lord left them to their
reasonings; He refused to tell them what, had they reasoned sincerely, they
might learn for themselves.
What
is seen in the Gospels, had taken place from the beginning. Our first parents
were as ready with excuses, as their posterity when Christ came. First, Adam
says, "I hid myself, for I was afraid;" though fear and shame were
not the sole or chief reasons why he fled, but an incipient hatred, if it may
be said, of his Maker. Again, he says, "The woman, whom Thou gavest me ...
she gave me of the tree." And the woman says, "The serpent beguiled
me." They did not honestly surrender themselves to their offended God, but
had something to say in their behalf. Again, Cain says, when asked where his
brother was, whom he had murdered, "Am I my brother's keeper?"
Balaam,
again, is a most conspicuous instance of a double mind, or of hypocrisy. He has
a plausible reason for whatever he does; he can so skilfully defend himself,
that to this day he looks like a good man, and his conduct and fortunes are a
perplexity to many minds. But it is one thing to have good excuses, another to
have good motives. He had not the love of the truth, the love of God, in his
heart; he was covetous of worldly goods; and, therefore, all his excuses only
avail to mark him as double-minded.
Again:
Saul is another very remarkable instance of a man acting for his own ends, and
yet having plausible reasons for what he did. He offered
sacrifice on one {233} occasion, not having a commission; this was a sin; yet
what was his excuse?—a very fair one. Samuel had promised to come to offer the
sacrifice, and did not. Saul waited some days, the people grew discouraged, his
army fell off, and the enemy was at hand,—so, as he says, he "forced himself."
[1 Sam. xiii. 12.]
Such
is the conduct of insincere men in difficulty. Perhaps their difficulty may be
a real one; but in this they differ from the sincere:—the latter seek God in
their difficulty, feeling that He only who imposes it can remove it; but
insincere men do not like to go to God; and to them the difficulty is only so
much gain, for it gives them an apparent reason, a sort of excuse, for not
going by God's rule, but for deciding in their own way. Thus Saul took his own
course; thus Jeroboam, when in a difficulty, put up calves of gold and
instituted a new worship without Divine command. Whereas, when Hezekiah was in
trouble, he took the letter of Sennacherib, "and went up into the house of
the Lord, and spread it before the Lord." [Isa. xxxvii. 14.] And when St.
Peter was sinking in the water, he cried out to Christ, "Lord, save
me." [Matt. xiv. 30.] And in like manner holy David, after he had sinned
in numbering the people, and was told to choose between three punishments
offered him, showed the same honest and simple-hearted devotion in choosing
that of the three which might be the most exactly called falling into the
Lord's hands. If he must suffer, let the Lord chastise him.—"I am in a
great strait," he says; "let us fall now into the hands of the Lord;
for {234} His mercies are great; and let me not fall into the hand of
man." [2 Sam. xxiv. 14.]
Great,
then, is the difference between sincere and insincere Christians, however like
their words may be to each other; and it is needless to say, that what I have
shown in a few examples, might be instanced again and again from every part of
Scripture, particularly from the history of the Jews, as contained in the
Prophets. All men, even after the gift of God's grace, sin: God's true servants
profess and sin,—sin, and are sorry; and hypocrites profess and sin,—sin and are
sorry. Thus the two parties look like each other. But the word of God
discriminates one from the other by this test,—that Christ dwells in the
conscience of one not of the other; that the one opens his heart to God, the
other does not; the one views Almighty God only as an accidental guest, the
other as Lord and owner of all that he is; the one admits Him as if for a
night, or some stated season, the other gives himself over to God, and
considers himself God's servant and instrument now and for ever. Not more
different is the intimacy of friends from mere acquaintance; not more different
is it to know a person in society, to be courteous and obliging to him, to
interchange civilities, from opening one's heart to another, admitting him into
it, seeing into his, loving him, and living in him;—than the external worship
of the hypocrite, from the inward devotion of true faith; approaching God with
the lips, from believing on Him with the heart; so opening to the Spirit that
He opens to us, from so living to self as to exclude the light of heaven. {235}
Now,
as to applying what I have been showing from Scripture to ourselves, this shall
here be left, my brethren, to the consciences of each of us, and a few words
will suffice to do this. Do you, then, habitually thus unlock your hearts and
subject your thoughts to Almighty God? Are you living in this conviction of His
Presence, and have you this special witness that that Presence is really set up
within you unto your salvation, viz. that you live in the sense of it? Do you
believe, and act on the belief, that His light penetrates and shines through
your heart, as the sun's beams through a room? You know how things look when
the sun's beams are on it,—the very air then appears full of impurities, which,
before it came out, were not seen. So is it with our souls. We are full of
stains and corruptions, we see them not, they are like the air before the sun
shines; but though we see them not, God sees them: He pervades us as the
sunbeam. Our souls, in His view, are full of things which offend, things which
must be repented of, forgiven, and put away. He, in the words of the Psalmist,
"has set our misdeeds before Him, our secret sins in the light of His
countenance." [Ps. xc. 8.] This is most true, though it be not at all welcome
doctrine to many. We cannot hide ourselves from Him; and our wisdom, as our
duty, lies in embracing this truth, acquiescing in it, and acting upon it. Let
us then beg Him to teach us the Mystery of His Presence in us, that, by
acknowledging it, we may thereby possess it fruitfully. Let us confess it in
faith, that we may possess it unto justification. Let us so {236} own it, as to
set Him before us in everything. "I have set God always before me,"
says the Psalmist, "for He is on my right hand, therefore I shall not
fall." [Ps. xvi. 8.] Let us, in all circumstances, thus regard Him.
Whether we have sinned, let us not dare keep from Him, but with the prodigal
son, rise and go to Him. Or, if we are conscious of nothing, still let us not
boast in ourselves or justify ourselves, but feel that "He who judgeth us
is the Lord." In all circumstances, of joy or sorrow, hope or fear, let us
aim at having Him in our inmost heart; let us have no secret apart from Him.
Let us acknowledge Him as enthroned within us at the very springs of thought
and affection. Let us submit ourselves to His guidance and sovereign direction;
let us come to Him that He may forgive us, cleanse us, change us, guide us, and
save us.
This
is the true life of saints. This is to have the Spirit witnessing with our
spirits that we are sons of God. Such a faith alone will sustain the terrors of
the Last Day; such a faith alone will be proof against those fierce flames
which are to surround the Judge, when He comes with His holy Angels to separate
between "those who serve God, and those who serve Him not." [Mal.
iii. 18.]
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