NO GROWTH OR LEARNING WITHOUT EXERCISE
NO GROWTH OR LEARNING WITHOUT EXERCISE
There is no growing without exercise; you would not expect to learn to write without pains and assiduity. We learn truth either because of our need, or for our need. In the latter case the need has not yet come, but in either case there can be no real learning but through suffering and exercise. The mistake with many saints in the present day is that they think because they can describe a truth, that therefore they have [p. 208] learned it. When a truth is really accepted, the conscience demands that there should be accordance with it. No one can teach well what he has not had much trouble in learning. The exercise in learning acquaints one with the care and attention which are required in order to be a proficient. You cannot teach writing unless you can tell what hinders and what facilitates good writing, and to know this you must have passed through these exercises; ‘the sixpence you make wears like steel’. But besides this there must adding (see 2 Peter 1), or there is not vital power. It is easier to add when there is already some measure of any virtue, but it is the more necessary when there is a deficiency, and the Lord’s ministry is always directed to the deficiency in order that there may be symmetry. Whatever we have most of is what we really most desire, and often what we have least of we are most satisfied with, just because we do not know enough of it to know its value. Many a one knows a language who could not teach it, he has never studied the grammar, though ordinarily he may speak good grammar. The danger in the present day is that so many can adopt and speak the language of divine truth, though it be quite a different one to his mother tongue, without passing through the exercise which would acquaint him with the exactions which it makes on one who truly learns it; and this alone qualifies for teaching it.
Divine truth is the life of Jesus and not a mere theory, and one must know it in life, in order to present it in life. Trying to act out what I see and hear, imparts to me great blessing as to every truth. I find it touches me on every point, and as I have said, where I have gained most already, I am glad to gain more, for I appreciate it better; but where I am most defective, there is most exercise of conscience, but not the same readiness to receive or adopt. I am to be always like one practising at the piano, not the tunes I know best [p. 209] but the ones at which I am most unskilful, and the more skilful I become at them, the better musician am I in every other, or for any other. You must practise, you must take pains. The deep ponderings of the middle ages though with less light, surpass the shallow platitudes of the present day with so much light. There is no depth where there has not been deep exercise, and the thought which has come from deep exercise, like the notes of a well-practised musician, has a tone and a mellowness about it, which tells of the long journey it has taken before being presented to the public. Any measure of gift is like taste; where you have most taste is where you never can accomplish anything quite to your satisfaction.