THE OLD THINGS WILL DROP OFF

of themselves.  This is what is meant by the “new heart.”  It means that God puts into us new thoughts and new wishes, and we become quite different.

III.

Lastly, and very shortly.  What was the third head?  “Grammar.”  Right.

Now, I require a clever boy to answer the next question.  What is the verb?  “Seek.”  Very good:  “seek.”  What mood is it in?  “Imperative mood.”  What does that mean?  “A command.”  What is the soldier’s first lesson?  “Obedience.”  Have you obeyed this command?  Remember the imperative mood of these words, “Seek first the Kingdom of God.”

This is the command of your King.  It must be done.  I have been trying to show you what a splendid thing it is; what a reasonable thing it is; what a happy thing it is; but beyond all these reasons, it is a thing that must be done, because we are commanded to do it by our Captain.  Now, there is His command to seek first the Kingdom of God.  Have you done it?

“Well,” I know some boys will say, “we are going to have a good time, enjoy life, and then we are going to seek—­last—­the Kingdom of God.”

Now, that is mean; it is nothing else than mean for a boy to take all the good gifts that God has given him, and then give him nothing back in return but

          HIS WASTED LIFE.

God wants boys’ lives, not only their souls.  It is for active service that soldiers are drilled, and trained, and fed, and armed.  That is why you and I are in the world at all—­not to prepare to go out of it some day, but to serve God actively in it now.  It is monstrous, and shameful, and cowardly to talk of seeking the Kingdom last.  It is shirking duty, abandoning one’s rightful post, playing into the enemy’s hand by doing nothing to turn his flank.  Every hour a Kingdom is coming in your heart, in your home, in the world near you, be it a Kingdom of Darkness or a Kingdom of Light.  You are placed where you are, in a particular business, in a particular street, to help on there the Kingdom of God.  You cannot do that when you are old and ready to die.  By that time your companions will have fought their fight, and lost or won.  If they lose, will you not be sorry that you did not help them?  Will you not regret that only at the last you helped the Kingdom of God?  Perhaps you will not be able to do it then.  And then your life has been lost indeed.

Very few people have the opportunity to seek the Kingdom of God at the end.  Christ, knowing all that, knowing that religion was a thing for our life, not merely for our death-bed, has laid this command upon us now:  “Seek first the Kingdom of God.”

I am going to leave you with this text itself.  Every boy in the world should obey it.