Romans 14:12

Individualism

Rom 14:12

Not, we shall give account of ourselves as congregations, councils, committees, boards of direction, organisations; but, as individual souls. We must be very careful, therefore, how we deal lightly or loosely with the doctrine and practice of individualism. Many men would be only too glad to pluralise themselves, and leave the responsibility with the other people. That is the danger of all combinations. A man who is really a man, and who is perfectly honest when trading with you face to face and alone, is not always so honest when he becomes one of a number. His individuality is multiplied, yet divided; it is increased, yet lessened: he is timid, he is not intellectually equal to the occasion he is not a debater, he has no gift of expression or criticism, and therefore he may allow things to be done which he would never think of doing in his own personal and private capacity and business. It is desirable to make this doctrine of individualism very clear, because to-day it has no favour in certain quarters. It is sneered at, it is frowned upon, it is altogether unpopular. One wonders why. Such unpopularity has no vindication that I can find in the Bible; and that which is without vindication in the Bible is to me always suspicious. On the contrary, I find in the Bible the doctrine of individualism taught in the clearest and directest terms "Every one of us shall give account of himself to God." That is the consummation of the doctrine; that could not come in at the end if it had not come in at the beginning; this is the ripening or maturing of all that has gone before. This is a revelation of the plan upon which the universe is administered in one sentence, man by man, soul by soul, one by one: thus we die, thus we shall be judged. Therefore there must be in this individualism something that ought to be inquired into, deeply, devoutly, and practically, with a view to its application to our personal daily life.

Notice that there are various individual units. The radical unit is the one man; without that unit you cannot move. Then there is the unit of the family; a family may be spoken of as one a family, the family, this family. Then there is the unit of the nation; each nation has its own repute or character or credit or history. Then there is the unit of the world. All these are individualities, yet they all go back to the one man, the one soul, the personal judgment, the personal will, the personal conscience. If we are wrong there, we are wrong everywhere. Communism is sanctified and ennobled individualism. You cannot by putting a great number of corrupt individualities together make that which is clean, pure and divine. Unless, therefore, we get down to the radical unit and make that right and set it to work on proper principles we shall be wrong in the family, in the nation, and in the world. Let us remember the radical unit. Individualism may be abused. What is there that cannot be degraded? If men are condemning the abuses and corruptions of individualism, we of necessity go with them in all their condemnation: but we are not to condemn the instance at the expense of the principle. The doctrine is the same, and must be retained inviolate and applied fearlessly and impartially, though there may be instances, on the one side or the other, apparently confirming or contradicting that principle. We have nothing in the meantime to do with the mere instance; we are engaged now in fixing our thought intently upon the doctrine that, without personal individuality of character, we cannot have anything that is noble and beneficent in the family, in the nation, or in the world.

There is a debased individuality even in religious circles. That is a fault I have to find with some communions and churches. They are almost always of necessity talking about themselves, their own statistics, their own progress, their own funds, their own figure before the world. That is a debased instance of communal or congregational individualism. Then I have also to find fault with men, individual men, who, as the common phrase is, play for their own hand. They do not consider the case which they deal with broadly, in all its relations and issues. They must of necessity consider each himself how he will stand, how he will be totalled up in the schedule. This is not individualism, this is mere selfism; this is cultivating selfish vanity and aspiration at the expense of all that is holiest in spiritual ambition. There is also a true individuality; in this sense, individualism is the security of co-operation; individualism in this sense is the security of society. Corrupt men can never hold themselves together except for the one chance, the immediate occasion, and transient condition; they will fall foul of one another: individually corrupt, they cannot be socially noble. My contention, therefore, is that individualism, ennobled and sanctified, is the security of society, and that society is impossible without such individualism. Hence we have the grand doctrine and practice of personal responsibility. There is no transfer of obligation from one man to another. This is a trick we may adopt amongst ourselves; but in the sight of God the practice will be put down with infinite judgment and rebuke, and will be condemned to everlasting darkness. We say, It was my brother: it was my fellow-minister: it was my co-director: it was my partner in business. But God will not have it so. He will say to us, You ought not to have had any one in your reckoning that could vitiate the process, that could interfere with the responsibility. "Every one of us shall give account of himself to God," and that miserable and detestable partner of yours, who is always interfering with your great schemes, he must be named. You have never named him, you have referred to him as a figure behind the arras; you must name him, and in his own personality he must be burned in the fire of hell. Thus I contend that individualism may be debased, and thus I further contend that individualism may be ennobled. I am advocating the ennobled individualism; and that individualism must of necessity recognise the individual rights of other men. If you find an individualism that denies rights to other men, that individualism is foul, corrupt, debased; it is not the individualism we are seeking to promote. I repeat that by the very necessity of the case when the individual is right he must recognise the rights of other men. What have we then? This recognition is the very secret of co-operation; this recognition keeps the waters of life sweet and pure. I must give what I claim. Do I claim the right of private judgment? I must concede it. Do I claim to act in the fear and sight of God in all matters concerning myself? I must allow that other men are as honest and high-minded as I claim to be.

What have we, then, in this development and application of individualism? Why, we have the true communism, the real, healthy, permanent brotherhood. Any other combination is a sham, and must end in failure. Whatever is not based upon individual conviction and regulated by individual conscience is a truce, a compromise, an expedient for the time being, a process of giving and taking that may end to the detriment of moral integrity. Thus we set up in the sight and fear of God a real, generous, noble, sanctified individualism. And thus, and thus only, can we come to fraternity. The mischief is that so many persons imagine we cannot have unity unless we have uniformity. That is the vicious fallacy that enfeebles and debases so much of political and ecclesiastical reasoning. Individuality knows nothing about uniformity. Yet individuality claims to grow up into the highest unity. Life is multifold. Life is not a brick-built wall; life is a garden, a forest, a landscape; the landscape may be one, though every field is different in geometric form and every tree is distinct from every other tree on all the green undulation. When will men recognise the difference between unity and uniformity? Some persons cannot be persuaded that we are making any progress until we all walk alike, and until we are all practically of the same stature, and until we are almost indistinguishable the one from the other. I have never known that to be the Divine law. The Scripture gives no sanction to any such interpretation of human nature and human fellowship. Let every man be himself. The Lord has given to one man five talents, to another two, and to another one; and nowhere does he say, Total them up into eight, divide the eight by three, and I will take an account of you for the integer and the fraction. He calls each man to account for his five talents, for his two talents, for his one talent. There is individuality, and yet there might have been unity in co-operation, in the one cheering the other, helping and appreciating the other. Lay down the fundamental doctrine that uniformity is man's trick: unity is God's purpose.

This idea of uniformity has ruined some sections of the Church. Some sections of the Church are nothing apart from their distinctiveness. Not where they are like others, but where they are unlike or individual their genius and their power begin. This uniformising has led to a great decadence in the power of the Christian pulpit. Men will have all preachers alike; they will have all sermons cast in one mould; they will have all begin at the same place, pass through the same process, end in the same consummation. That is not the Divine plan. I would have every minister be himself. There is no one man who is all other men. No minister is the ministry. Where then do we find unity? We find it in the fact and in the claim that the ministry of Christ is one. We are not individual preachers only. Each preacher represents what he can represent of what he has known, felt, tasted, and handled of the word of life. We must hear all the ministers before we hear the ministry. We are not all called upon to do the same work. The conception that every individual section in the Christian Church must go and do the same work in the same place is the ruin of co-operation, as well as of individuality. Suppose there are twenty sects in Christendom: are all these twenty sects to go down to one village in order to convert it or evangelise it? Nothing of the kind. I ask, what sect is there already? If it is an honest, true-hearted, hardworking sect, I will keep away. It may be my sect or it may be some other sect, but if the work is being done I am doing it, though I am not there, if I be really in sympathy with all Christian development and all Christian progress. I will go further and say, that nineteen of the sects must keep away from ground that is preoccupied, and they must send down to the men who have preoccupied it all the money they want. Have the Methodists got possession of that village? If so, send them what funds they need from the Congregationalists, from the Presbyterians, from the Baptists. We are nowhere commanded to go down twenty strong and divide a little population by our ecclesiastical contentions and differences. I would go further still: I would look around and examine whether, within my own communion, there are men who can do a certain kind of work. If I can find the men, I ought to support them in the first instance; but if I cannot find the men that are needed, within the boundaries of my own communion, I must look abroad and see who is doing the work that requires to be done, and though he may not fight under my particular ecclesiastical banner, he is fighting under the colours of the Cross, and must be sustained and supported by all Christian communions. Personally, I could not do a certain kind of work. It is something for a man to know the limitation of his faculty and of his responsibility. Other men can do it a thousand times better than I can do it. Have I therefore to go down and say, "I must do this particular work, whoever else is trying to do it or not trying to do it," when I know I cannot do it? I will never follow so narrow and so base a policy. I believe the Salvation Army, for example, belongs to all the churches. In the fact that it belongs to none in particular, I find the fact that it belongs to all in general. If we are earnest Christian souls, each working where he can, and where he can do so best, we are part of the Salvation Army, and we ought to send our prayers and our gifts after it. We may be able to give money and not to give counsel; let us do what we can do, and leave undone what God never meant us to attempt. On the other hand, I believe that there is a work that the Salvation Army cannot do, that other men can do much better, a work of exposition and teaching and training and consolidating; let these men know their gift and calling of God, and carry out the Divine purpose conscientiously. Here we have individuality, and here we have community and co-operation; here we have unity, and, blessed be God, here we have nothing of uniformity. Understand that human nature is multiplex, many-sided, doubled and re-doubled with innumerable complications; understand that that fact necessitates a multifold ministry; some can do one thing and some can do another: let each do what he can do, or what it as a congregation or organisation can do, and God will bless us all.

When we get rid of this notion of organisation and uniformity, we shall be liberated, and shall go on our way rejoicing. If the Lord has made any two hundred or two thousand men all of the same size and all of the same pattern, and so alike that they do not know themselves and are always mistaking themselves for other people, then by all means let them unite and make what they can of themselves; I have never seen them, and never heard of them. Looking abroad upon society, and studying human nature in practical instances, I find that God seems to have taken a delight (with reverence be it spoken) in differentiating man from man, in giving each man a personality of his own; and he seems to say to us through great instincts and sympathies, Now you are very different, yet you may all be one; I mean you to be united; find the common measure, find the uniting line; and whilst retaining all your individuality enter into one another's feelings and sympathies and activities, and whilst communising yourselves never forget your individuality. Hear this great voice sounding through all the corridors of history "Every one of us shall give account of himself to God."

It will be something if I have drawn your minds with any steadiness to the contemplation of the fact, that individualism may be abused, and if I can enforce upon your judgment and conscience the fact that I am not supporting an abused individualism, but an individualism that means personal thinking, personal conscience, personal service, personal obedience: and it will be still something more if I have begun to suggest to opening minds the great fact, that uniformity is a false standard of judgment, and that only by bringing all the individualities together do we get the right conception of the Church. This is my explanation or philosophy of denominationalism. Some men could not be Quakers. That is a melancholy fact, perhaps, but it is a fact in history. And the Quakers are beginning to find that they themselves can no longer be themselves, but must hobnob with the Philistines on the other side of the wall; they are becoming gay and frivolous, and curiously and inexplicably ecclesiastical. All men could not be Congregationalists, nor could all men be Presbyterians, or Episcopalians. I believe in all sects that are honest: grace, mercy, and peace be to them, yea, to all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity. I do not deny the unity of the human race because no two men are alike; I do not deny society because every man has a way of thinking peculiar to himself. If any one communion gets up and says, "I can do all that is wanting to be done of a religious nature in this world," I have no confidence in it; that communion has not recognised the fundamental fact of the difference between man and man, temperament and temperament, education and education, environment and environment. If my own sect should arise and say, I am sent of God to be the one Church of the world, I should leave it. It is a foolish and an impious claim. I want to hear each sect say, I have a work to do, my Lord sent me to do this particular kind of work; let me work side by side with you, if you please, and you will be doing your kind of work, I will be doing my kind of work, and we all belong to the one Master; and because we belong to the one Cross we are really one, though our methods of working and our progress and our policies are different in colour and in words. Some men seem to think that each Church must stand up and say, there is no other Church; as if Congregationalism must be put down because it cannot do all the religious work required by the world; and as if Anglicanism should be put down on the same ground. Nothing of the kind. Each has its sphere, each has its function; let each recognise this fact, and in that recognition there will be the beginning of union and the guarantee of harmony. There is an individualism that seeks its life and loses it; there is also an individualism that loses its life and finds it. In the Church I would make room for everybody. Have you a tongue? have you a prophecy? have you a psalm? There are diversities of administration, but the same spirit; there are manifold gifts, but the same Divine use of them: as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office, yet all the members constitute the one body, so we, being many in Christ, constitute the whole Church of Christ. The Papists are in it, and the Quakers are in it, and all honest and godly souls are in it; and even the unclassified portion of men may be in it, without knowing it. "Other sheep," said the great Shepherd, "other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also must I bring." "Them also" wondrous "also." He will not rest until all who are even groping after him have felt his hand and seen his face.

Let us have no patched-up compromises one with another The man who has one talent is as much the servant of God as the man who has five; he must give an account of his one talent. The man who can work best in one pulpit and in one church is as much a servant of God as the evangelist who flies from continent to continent, and makes all the world his sphere of usefulness. The Sunday-school teacher who can only speak to two scholars at a time, because three would make too much of a public meeting, is as much a teacher of Christ's kingdom, i in earnest and if enlightened, as if he could address ten thousand men in thunder-tones. Why will we not recognise these differences, and praise them not as mere differences; not construe them into hostilities, but regard them as individualities which total up into the great unity? The universe is one; etymologically, its very name signifies oneness, yet how wondrous in difference; what light and shade, what contrast of colour, what mingling and intermingling of voices, sounds, tones; what mountains and rivers, what hills and dales, what mystery of coming and going, what eternal processions and revolutions! Shall the universe break itself up into parts and say that some other part does not belong to the universe? Nay, verily: so must not we break ourselves up into a debased individualism: neither must we give up our individuality, and say, Other men shall think for us. If you examine this matter still further in the light of the history of religious organisations, you will find individuality everywhere. Even on a committee there is a man who determines the whole thing for you. He is not necessarily the greatest mind on the committee, but he is a capable man, he has had most opportunity of thinking about the business, forecasting it and arranging it, and if he does not always have his way he thinks himself hardly and cruelly used; and as nobody wants to use any other body cruelly he gets his way, and then denounces the idea of individualism! He will have none of it; not knowing that he is himself the most debased individuality in the organisation which he rules. There may be great show of freedom where there is really no liberty. A man may so nationalise himself as to include everybody, and yet when an individual comes to preach for me he may tap him on the head, and say, "Not to-day, sir!" And this is the man who is so magnificently nationalised that he knows nothing about your little sectarian limitations. Beware! In some breadths there is nothing but vacancy. Beware! sometimes intensity means reality of soul and conviction of purpose. However much we may pine for uniformity even, never forget that every one of us shall give account of himself, and of nobody else, to God. How can I prepare for that judgment? Only by being one with my Lord, who recognised all differences and reconciled all individualities; and who is drawing up unto himself all men that may find the fulness of the meaning of their manhood in his Deity. So we come back to the Cross; we always end on Calvary; to end otherwhere would be to be lost in the desert: to end here is to end in peace and gladness.

Prayer

Almighty God, we bless thee for the healing Christ. We all need healing; we are wounds and bruises in thy sight: Lord, touch us, heal us, make us strong. Thou art the giver of strength, thou art the fountain of power; we come to thee for renewal of energy; because thy compassions fail not we are made young again every morning. Every good gift and every perfect gift are thine, and thine only; we have nothing that we have not received: how then shall we return thanks unto God, who daily loadeth us with benefits? He healeth all our diseases, he makes us strong by the ministry of his love. We thank thee for all men who so far imitate the Saviour as to seek the healing of others; wherein they know not what they do they give thanks unto God; wherein they deny the very Master they serve, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge; open their eyes that they may see, and show them that to heal is to pray, to do good is to love, to seek the higher benefits for men is to act in the spirit of the Saviour. We bless thee for all good institutions, all healing ministries, all hallowed forces and agencies, and we pray that they may be sanctified to the accomplishment of their holy purpose. The Lord cause the spirit of pity to dwell amongst us. If we pity one another we shall come to love God; if we love God we cannot help pitying one another: he who loveth God loveth his neighbour also; if he say he love God and do not love his neighbour, thou hast made him a liar, and thou hast accounted him as an offence in thy sanctuary. Help us therefore to know the right relations of things and to act lovingly and trustfully, knowing that the Lord is accomplishing an immeasurable and beneficent purpose in all the darkness and discipline and chastening of life. Good Lord, hear us for the sick, the troubled, and for those who are appointed to die. Are we not all so appointed? Yet some must die to-day, some tomorrow, and their death so sudden will bring great clouds upon the house. The Lord help such to believe that all is ordered, that there is an appointed time to man upon the earth, that not to know that appointed time is one of the blessings thou dost give unto thy children. Thus let the Lord hear us, and fill all heaven with a cloud that shall break in blessings upon our life. Amen.