James Philip

As I was preparing this, um, episode, my mind was drawn to something really beautiful that I read many, many years ago, I think in first year at university.

It was in a marvelous little book called Christian Maturity by James Philip.

And very near the end, there's quite a long quote from a tract published by the Oriental Missionary Society, a tract that's called Tenderness of Spirit.

And really, when Jesus greets us and deals with us with such tenderness of spirit- It will produce the same in us.

This all-pervading tenderness of spirit is not an ovicide grace.

It is not a product of April, but of October.

And then James Philip, after that beautiful quotation, he goes on to say this, A good and fair test to apply in this connection is to ask oneself the question, Am I the kind of Christian that a man who had failed would instinctively shrink from and say, Oh no, I could not confide in him? Or would he feel free to come to me in trouble? It is said of our Lord that sinners gathered around him, drawn not repelled by his holiness.

And that's what I'm trying to say today.