Chapter 21 - Page 2

thoroughly bad, and have altogether lost our love, so that we will have nothing more to do with them unless they mend? Or do we begin by making them feel that however grieved we are with them, we love them still; that however wrong they have been, there is right feeling left in them still; and by giving them credit for whatever good there is in them--by appealing to that; calling on them to act up to that; to be true to themselves, and to their better nature; saying, You can do right in one thing--then do right in another--and do right in all? If we do not do this we do wrong; we destroy our children's self-respect, we make them despair of improving, we make them fancy themselves bad children: that is the very surest plan we can take to make them bad children, by making them reckless.

But if we be wise parents--such parents to our children as St Paul was to his spiritual children, the Corinthians--we shall do by them just what St Paul did by these Corinthians. Before he says one harsh word to them, he will awaken in them faith and love. He will make them trust him and love him, all the more because he knows that through false teaching they do not trust and love him as they used to do. But till they do, he knows that there is no use in rebuking them. Till they trust him and love him, they will not listen to him. And how does he try to bring them round to him? By praising them:--by telling them that he trusts them and loves them, because in spite of all their faults there is something in them worthy to be loved and trusted. He begins by giving them credit for whatever good there is in them. They are rich in all utterance and all knowledge; that is, they are very brilliant and eloquent talkers about spiritual things, and also very deep and subtle thinkers about spiritual things. So far so good. These are great gifts--gifts of Christ, too,-- tokens that God's spirit is with them, and that all they need is to be true to His gracious inspirations. Then, when he has told them that, or rather made them understand that he knows that, and is delighted at it, then he can go on safely and boldly to tell them of their sins also in the plainest and sternest and yet the most tender and fatherly language.

This is very important, my friends. I cannot tell you fully how important I think it, in more ways than one. I am sure that if we took St Paul's method with our children we should succeed with them far better than we do. And I think, I have thought long, that if we could see that St Paul's method with those Corinthians was actually the same as God's method with us, we should have far truer notions of God, and God's dealings with us; and should reverence and value far more that Holy Catholic Church into which we have been, by God's infinite mercy, baptized, and wherein we have been educated.

For, and now I entreat you to listen to me carefully, you who have sound heads and earnest hearts, ready and willing to know the truth about God