Proud, self-willed
thoughts are surely out of place to-day (and what day are they in place?)
On this day God agonised for man: but it is a day of triumph and
deliverance; and we must go home as men who have stood by and seen a
fearful fight--a fight which makes the blood of him who watches it run
cold; but we have seen, too, a glorious victory--such a victory as never
was won on earth before or since; and we therefore must think cheerfully
of the battle, for the sake of the victory that was won; and remember
that on this day death was indeed swallowed up in victory--because death
was the victory itself.
The question on which the fate of the whole world depended was, whether
Christ dare die; and He dared die. Whether Christ would endure to the
end; and He did endure. Whether He would utterly drink the cup which His
Father had given Him; and He drank it to the dregs; and so by His very
agony He showed Himself noble, beautiful, glorious, adorable, beyond all
that words can express. And so the cross was His throne of glory; the
prints of the nails in His hands and feet were the very tokens of His
triumph; His very sorrows were His bliss; and those last words, "It is
finished," were no cry of despair, but a trumpet-call of triumph, which
rang from the highest heaven to the lowest hell, proclaiming to all
created things, that the very fountain of life, by dying, had conquered
death, that good had conquered evil, love had conquered selfishness, God
had conquered man, and all the enemies of man; and that He who died was
the first begotten from the dead, and the King of all the princes of the
earth, who was going to fulfil, more and more, as the years and the ages
rolled on, the glorious prayer which we have prayed this day, graciously
to behold that family for whom He had been contented to die; and wisely
and orderly to call each man to a vocation and a ministry, in which he
might duly serve God and be a blessing to all around him, by the
inspiration of Christ's Holy Spirit; and to have mercy, in His own good
time, upon all Jews, Turks, heathens, and infidels, and bring them home
to His flock, that they may be saved, and made one fold under one
Shepherd--Him who was dead and is alive for evermore.
Pages:
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130