Southern Christian Advocate

HELPING ONE ANOTHER.

Helping one another is a fundamental duty of Christian life. Christ taught it as a doctrine; illustrated it as a sentiment, and then enforced it to the fullest compass of human activity, by his holy example. Apostles renewed his instructions and applied them to the practical concerns of every-day existence. On no subject is the New Testament more pointed, more explicit, more emphatic. Agreeably to its injunctions, we are to bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ. In view of this purpose, all forms of society are forms of mutual assistance, and indeed according to its integral idea, society is mainly an institution of help. The highest and purest organization of society, viz: the Christian church, is a divine institution of help, which is designed to make each of its members auxiliary to the growth and strength of all others.

Clearly, then, we are to help one another. We are to help ourselves by helping others. It is not enough to be wise and prosperous, and good, but we must make others like ourselves. If we fail to aid our neighbors, we fail to aid ourselves, and hence, our culture and all our private success are radically corrupted. A Christian man must use himself, his endowments, his means of influence, his wealth, his character, to lift up others; nor can he be a Christian if he rises in the scale of personal being and in outward improvement of circumstances, without carrying up his fellow men and especially, fellow Christians with him. Others grow as he grows. The books he reads, the acquirements he gains, the spirit he cultivates, the home he adorns, the talent he matures, the honor he wins, all repeat themselves in greater or less measure, in the church and the world, reappearing in the sphere to which he belongs and ennobling it by his presence and power. Such a man cannot live to himself. His life is in others, for others, and through others. The badge of his character is, that he helps others and this badge, known and read of all men, is God's endorsement that he is a co-worker with Christ.

But no duty, taken in all its bearings, is less understood, and less practiced than this duty of help. Like the Levite in the parable, designed to teach this greatest of social truths, we look on our struggling, wounded brother, and, content with a careless or curious glance, pass by on the other side. Like the priest, we contemplate the wronged and injured man, suffering from the brutality of individuals or from the evils of society, and turn coldly away from him and his pangs. Men who are Levites and priests-men appointed of God for the work of helping-forget their chief task, and, at one and the same time and by one and the same act of official and personal heartlessness, are guilty of sacrificing their professional obligations and private duty. If these Levites and priests are thus insensible to the sanctity of redeemed brotherhood, what can be expected of others not in their position and not vested with the same degree of responsibility? All of us are fruitful in excuses to relieve ourselves from this duty. Doubtless the priest and the Levite had their apology and explanation. Doubtless they considered the relief of the wounded man as some other person's business. Doubtless they felt a pang at his condition, and straightway appeased their rebuking hearts, by the professional plea that they had their own work to do. And so with all persons. The obligation to help is amiably shifted to some other individual, who is a convenient proxy for the troubled conscience.

In all such instances we are guilty of supreme selfishness. The real fact is, that it suits not our case, refinement, business, to afford the help needed. Our taste runs not that way; our time is otherwise occupied; our hands are engrossed with other engagements. Anomalous as it appears many good people are the victims of taste and refinement in this matter. Taste and refinement, if not carefully watched, do certainly tend to harden the affections in respect to these primary christian offices. Nor is any check on this dangerous selfishness.-the selfishness of cultivated and well-bred Christians,-so effectual and so thoroughly disciplinary, as the habit of helping such as need sympathy and relief.

Above all things, this is the work which we require to counteract the evils of tasteful culture. A severe test it is, but a true test, one most salutary and beautiful, one too, that directly determines our oneness of spirit with the mind of Christ.

Surely this is a time and surely we are living under such circumstances, that prompt us to answer the question. "who is my neighbor?" in the spirit of the blessed Jesus. Every highway and every by way is a road to Jericho -a road lined with men stripped, robbed, bruised, bleeding. Thousands have been robbed in intellect, in sympathy, in relations of home, in pursuits of business, in possessions, in prospects; and they need not only good Samaritans, but good priests and Levites, and, withal, a good many of them.

'Who is My neighbor?' should now be the daily question of each heart and the answer of Jesus should be the daily reply of our conduct.