nfinite object of our aspiration,
imitation, and affection. So we shall ever approach and never surpass
Jesus Christ. Such endless progress is the very salt of life. It keeps
us young when physical strength decays. It flames, an immortal hope, to
light the darkness of the grave when all other hopes are quenched in
night.

II. Now, for a moment, look at another thought, viz., the obligation.

It is a command, that is to say, the will is involved. Growth is to be
done by effort, and the fact that it is a command teaches us this, that
we are not to take this one metaphor as if it exhausted the whole of the
facts of the case in reference to Christian progress.

You would never think of telling a child to grow any more than you would
think of telling a plant to grow, but Peter does tell Christian men and
women to grow. Why? Because they are not plants, but men with wills,
which can resist, and can either further or hinder their progress.

'Lo! in the middle of the wood,
The folded leaf is wooed from out the bud,
... and there
Grows green and broad, and takes no care.'

But that is not how we grow. 'In the sweat of thy brow,' with pain and
peril, with effort and toil, and not otherwise, do men grow in
everything but stature. And especially is it so in the Christian
character. There are other metaphors that need to be taken into
consideration as well as this of growth, with all its sweet suggestions
of continuous, effortless, spontaneous advance.

The Christian progress is not only growth, it is warfare. The Christian
progress is not only growth, it is a race. The Christian progress is not
only growth, it is mortifying the old man. The Christian progress is not
only growth, it is putting off the old man with his deeds and putting on
the new! 'First the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the
ear,' was never meant for a complete account of how the Christian life
is perfected.

We are bidden to grow, and that command points to hindrances and
resistance, to the need for effort and the governing action of our own
wills.

The command is one sorely needed in the present state of our average
Christianity. Our churches are full of monsters, specimens of arrested
growth, dwarfs, who have scarcely grown since they were babes, infants
all their lives. I come to you with a very plain question: Have you any
more of Christ's beauty in your characters, any more of His grace