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Hamilton—Scottish Presbyterian, expounding Luke 16—reframes Lazarus at the gate. Not a nuisance. Not an accident. A package from God: an opportunity for beneficence, delivered to the door. The rich man didn’t open it. Moses and the Prophets said the same thing in writing; he treated them as parchment. Not one selfish indulgence surrendered.
Today we have developed more efficient systems for ensuring such packages are intercepted before delivery.
Sibbes—Puritan, encouraging the backslider—offers a self-check for election. Colossians 3:12: put on bowels of mercy toward the fatherless and needy. That’s how you demonstrate you’re one of the elect. Modern conservative Christianity has developed different assurance criteria. Mercy toward the needy as evidence of election has been quietly retired. Sibbes didn’t get that memo.
#puritan #grace #presbyterian #empathy #compassion #salvation
Hamilton—Church of Scotland, on the Christian life—states the marks of genuine salvation with some precision. Do good to all as opportunity arises. Devote yourself to godliness and goodness. Be unmoveable in the Lord’s work. He adds, with a logic that is difficult to escape, that this must still apply today—unless Christ has renounced his immutability since yesterday. All as opportunity arises includes, one notes, some currently unpopular recipients.
Manton—Puritan, expounding James—observes that hypocrites are deficient in one area specifically. They pray much, know much, hear much. They do not give much. Basil noticed the same centuries earlier: many excel at fasting and sighing, demonstrations costing nothing but personal discomfort, while remaining sordid toward the poor. Paul noticed. Basil noticed. Manton noticed. One wonders why it keeps needing to be said.
Davidson—Presbyterian, Ohio, expounding the Good Samaritan—asks a rhetorical question that answers itself. Does the enslaver love his neighbor as himself? He chains him. Separates his family. Takes his wages. And then, with an effrontery Davidson suggests hell itself should find embarrassing, binds the soul too. Today we consider it impolite to suggest that we all aren’t, in fact, loving neighbors all the time. Davidson would have found that fastidiousness somewhat misplaced.
Who’s UR neighbor?
Peter Stryker—Reformed Dutch pastor, surveying New York’s poorest—describes their situation as walls closing in daily, crushing them unless help arrives. Do you hear the shrieks? Don’t turn away because their poverty offends your refinement. And don’t say they authored their own misfortunes. That may be true of some, but not all, and in neither case is it a valid excuse for indifference. One notes that significant ministry energy currently flows in precisely the opposite direction.
Swinnock—English nonconformist, writing on the Christian life—identifies a specific sin that apparently afflicts many rich citizens: exploiting the desperation of poor tradesmen. The mechanic is starving, must sell, and the buyer knows it—offering a rate at which no amount of labour earns bread. Isaiah called this grinding the faces of the poor. Swinnock calls it great oppression.
Modern #Christian teaching is more exercised about paternalistic interference in free markets. Different emphasis.
