Matelda and the cloister of Hellfde : $b extracts from...

Thus much do we know of the journey of this redeemed soul from self-occupation and self-discipline, whilst Christ listened for her voice in vain, to the knowledge of the peace and joy that is in Him. And we know something also of her earthly path, told us in a spiritual song, which she calls “How fair is the Bridegroom, and how the bride followeth Him.”

Thus the revelation of the love of God, which was to the soul the opening of heaven, the entrance into the Father’s house where was the feast of joy, the music, and the dancing, was to lead to a walk of faithfulness here below, which would bring upon the witness of God persecution and shame and reproach.

Was it, therefore, that when the Lord had spoken to the Pharisees of the love which welcomes the publican and the sinner, of the joy and gladness into which the returning son was brought, He spoke to the disciples the solemn warning lest the riches, not only [61] temporal, but spiritual, entrusted to them as stewards should be wasted by them? Is it not true that the revelation to the soul of that which is in the Father’s house, the joy and the love, and the unspeakable riches of Christ, needs nothing less than Divine grace and power to keep us from misusing the treasure entrusted to us, and making it an occasion for feeding and exalting the fleshly mind?

Therefore Paul needed the thorn in the flesh, not to fit him for entering the third heaven, but after he had been there; so that the riches bestowed on him were not made an occasion for self-glorification, but he became a good steward of the manifold grace of God.

It is to be carefully remarked in the writings of Matilda, that she does not speak of this entrance into the gladness of heaven as an attainment. On the contrary, as we have seen, she speaks of the result of her repentance, of her conflict with the world, the flesh, and the devil, as being but weariness and thirst.

“For,” she says, “before the time when [62] Jesus Christ opened heaven with the key of His cross, there was no man so holy that he could, or that he might, ascend up into the Eternal heavens—not with labour or with the soaring of the imagination, not with longing or the stretching forth of imploring arms, not with the utmost yearning of his love. For Adam had fastened the bolt so firmly, that no man could open it. Shouldst Thou, then, O Eternal Father, keep fast the door of heaven with the bolt of Thy justice, so that sinners must remain without, I turn me to Jesus, Thy beloved Son, who holds in His hands the key of Thine almighty power.

“That key was forged in the land of the Jews, (and truly the Jews now would lock Thy people out of heaven and keep them in bondage), but when by Jesus the key was turned, the outcast sinner could enter into Thy love. But it is also the love of the Father who speaketh, and saith, ‘My soul endureth not that any sinner should be turned away who cometh to Me; therefore do I follow after many a soul for long, long years, till I lay hold upon him, and hold him fast.’”

By the Jews who would lock the people of God out of heaven Matilda, it need not be [63] said, had in her mind the Jews of Christendom, the professing Church being constantly called by her Jerusalem, and the formalist priests “those who follow the law of the Jews.”

For within the outward profession of Christianity, Matilda recognised the living Body of Christ. It is true that the two should have been one and the same, as the soul and the visible body are one person. But it was no longer so, and Matilda therefore saw the professing Church, Christendom, divided into two parts, the living and the dead, the true and the false, the children of God and the children of this world. To her the true and living Church was yet glorious and undivided, for it was united in one by the Spirit of God. Whether amongst professing Catholics or amongst the “Friends of God” who stood apart from Rome these living stones were found, there was yet but the one building, the dwelling-place of God.

If Matilda had no thoughts respecting the “Reunion of Christendom,” she had a firm belief in the Unity of the Church of God. It [64] could not be reunited, for it was the Body of Christ. The prayer of the Lord “that they all may be one,” had been heard. “I know,” He said, “that Thou hearest Me always.”

Through the ages when Christendom had been divided into countless sects, the true Members of Christ, whether they knew it or not, had been, and must be, one. It needed but to believe it, and to own it. But in order to recognise it as true, it was necessary that the eyes should be opened to see that the same profession of faith, or all varying professions of Christian faith, included the two classes, the living and the dead; the living, united together as the living members of the body; the dead, but separate particles of mouldering dust.