But, brethren, that presence is of no use at all to us unless we daily
try to realise it. He was with these men whether they would or no.
Whether they thought about Him or no, there He was; and just because
His presence did not at all depend upon their spiritual condition, it
was a lower kind of presence than that which you and I have now, and
which depends altogether on our realising it by the turning of our
hearts to Him, and by the daily contemplation of Him amidst all our
bustle and struggle.

Do you, as you go about your work, feel His nearness and try to keep
the feeling fresh and vivid, by occupying heart and mind with Him, by
referring everything to His supreme control? By trusting yourselves
utterly and absolutely in His hand, and gathering round you, as it
were, the sweetness of His love by meditation and reflection, do you
try to make conscious to yourselves your Lord's presence with you? If
you do, that presence is to you a blessed reality; if you do not, it
is a word that means nothing and is of no help, no stimulus, no
protection, no satisfaction, no sweetness whatever to you. The
children of the Bridegroom are glad only when, and as, they know that
the Bridegroom is with them.

III. And now a word, last of all, about the joy of the Bridegroom's
presence. What was it that made these humble lives so glad when Christ
was with them, filling them with strange new sweetness and power? The
charm of personal character, the charm of contact with one whose lips
were bringing to them fresh revelations of truth, fresh visions of
God, whose whole life was the exhibition of a nature beautiful, and
noble, and pure, and tender, and sweet, and loving, beyond anything
they had ever seen before.