From love to praise

Contents

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I. The Love of God for Every IVIan , . 3

II. Emptying the Sepulchre of a Dead

II II

EMPTYING THE SEPULCHRE OF A DEAD SOUL " Lazarus, come forth." — John xi. 43.

Miracles have been called parables in action. Some writers maintain that in the bosom of each great miracle of the New Testament lies a great spiritual truth ; that over and above the evidential purpose of these divine interpositions there is a clear design of instruction on some vital point pertaining to the kingdom of God. In this record of the resurrection of Lazarus the allegorizing interpreters have found a fruitful field, claiming that " the whole process of the sinner's restoration from the death of sin to a perfect spiritual life " is here shadowed forth. Without attempting to determine how far, if to any extent at all, an allegorical interpretation of the miracles is justified, it will not be questioned by any that these mighty and divine deeds of Christ are often beautifully illustrative of spiritual truth. Thickly scattered through the Scriptures are figures of speech that make this unmistakable. How often spiritual states are represented under physical aspects and conditions ! Sin is a leprosy — the sinner a leper. How natural, therefore, in the miracle of the healing of the leper, to trace the striking analogies between that and the spiritual healing by which a soul is rid of the leprosy of sin. Sin is a blindness, and the sinner is represented as groping in the darkness, " feeling after God." How clearly warranted, therefore, it is, in the use of the miracle of the healing of Bartimseus or of the man born blind, to note and emphasize the beautiful and effective correspondences between those restorations of physical sight and the exercise of that power by which a blinded soul is led to see God. So in the Scriptures, sin is death — the sinner is said to be " dead in trespasses and sins." Unquestionably, therefore, the miracle of the raising of Lazarus must furnish some marked points of resemblance to the miracle of the resurrection of a dead soul. Indeed, right in the bosom of the record of Lazarus' resurrection we find that the material fact is made, by Jesus, the occasion of expressing the profound corresponding Scriptural truth, " I am the resurrection, and the life : he that believeth on Me, though he die, yet shall he live ; and whosoever liveth and believeth on Me shall never die."

With this clear warrant for our course, let us see how a sepulchre was emptied at Bethany. Possibly we may the better see thereby how some sepulchres of sin about us, where our loved ones lie spiritually dead, may be spoiled of their possessions.

It is apparent, at the outset, that under this figure of death we shall find nothing answering to the sinner's own agency in securing eternal Hfe. That corpse in the tomb of Bethany will remain cold and stiff until the word of Christ thrill it again with new vitality. The dead can take no steps for their own resurrection. So the miracle will give us nothing illustrative of the sinner's sense of need and penitent confession and cry for mercy.

Vital as these are if a sinner is ever to be saved, let it be borne in mind it is under the fact and figure of death the sinner is here represented. And the dead can tell no need and make no cry.

Remembering, therefore, that no single miracle or parable or teaching of God's word brings out all sides of any great truth, let us see what there is in this record of the raising of the dead Lazarus that finds a voice for our instruction and spiritual profit.

The incidents of the resurrection group themselves under three heads: — I. The human antecedents.

II. The divine quickening.

III. The human consequent.

L The Human Antecedents. — ( i) Prayer was one of them. Jesus was sought. " Lord, behold, he whom Thou lovest is sick." A message. A prayer. A request. Lazarus was sick — probably dangerously sick — and it was the instinct of these loving, sisterly hearts to tell their Lord about it. They knew He had power to help, for had He not healed many ? Surely He would hasten to put His healing touch upon Lazarus, and bid the fever depart. But the Lord did not hasten ; " for He loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus," and " abode, therefore, two days in the place where He was." Because He loved, therefore. He waited. Marvelous sequitur. Yet it is often the Lord's way. Whom He loves He seems to refuse, that they may grow to something more Godlike in the fiery trial of unsatisfied longing and strange delay, and that they may see the greater glory of God as the issue of the matter.

Yet Jesus must be sent for. Delay may come by that road, but help will come by no other. It is said of the disciples of John the Baptist when he was beheaded that " they took up the body, and buried it, and went and told Jesus." That is the one thing we are to do in any difficulty, and especially in a difficulty of death — as when a brother or sister lies spiritually dead and friends hopelessly weep at the sepulchre. Restraint, reformation, watch, care — the use of these, even with suffering and sorrow — cannot raise the dead. As well lift a mountain from its base with wisps of tow. If in any home or church or place of toil and tears we would see one of these spiritual sepulchres emptied, we must send for Jesus — " Lord, behold, he whom Thou lovest is sick."

(2) Faith was another human antecedent in this miracle of resurrection. Jesus was sought and brought. He was sent for and He came. He was so sent for that He was led to come. It was the faith embosomed in the message that made it efficacious. The word of these troubled sisterly hearts to Jesus breathed a loving and reverent trust. And all the incidents of the touching narrative show that Martha and Mary confided in the Lord in a beautiful and undisturbed way, even though He had delayed His coming until their brother Lazarus was dead and buried four days. " Even now," says Martha, " even now, I know that whatsoever Thou shalt ask of God, God will 3 give Thee." And again she says, " Yea, Lord : I believe that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world."

" All things are possible to him that believeth." This seems a wide sweep for so human a thing as faith. But it is just the " wideness of God's mercy." Read the roll call of sainted worthies in the eleventh of Hebrews and see how the record of achievement stretches to the broadness of promise. " Kingdoms," " lions," " fire," " sword," " floods," " armies," succumbed to faith. Even "death" was no exception. "Women received their dead raised to life again." Faith commanded Christ at the door of the tomb of Lazarus, and Christ commanded the dead. Faith is just as surely the human antecedent to the resurrection of a dead soul. Prayer is our message sent to Jesus, but faith must throb through the prayer if the message is to bring Him. The form of the prayer is nothing. The spirit of the prayer is everything. It may be a broken cry, a groaning " that cannot be uttered " — a sweet, low, humble " Help me. Lord " — a mere statement, "He whom Thou lovest is sick," thus "giving the Lord information," as this kind of prayer has been derisively called by those who would have prayers hewn to a certain Hne, as if manufactured in a shop. How these critics of the letter have flung their shafts of wit at the praying that tells God something ! But Martha and Mary prayed so. And Jesus read between and beneath the lines ; saw their faith, and came.

But what must faith grasp in pleading with Christ to raise the dead ? Two distinct things. " Believest thou this ?" Christ asks of Martha, standing by the tomb of her dead brother. His question is definite. It passes on beyond the material fact to the spiritual truth ; from the resurrection of the body to the resurrection and eternal life of a dead soul. He has pointed out a specific thing faith is to take hold of. It is in the words, " I am the resurrection, and the life : he that believeth on Me, though he die, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth on Me, shall never die." And his question is, " Believest thou this ?" The specific thing is power. Christ is able. It is this faith is to grasp. Not simply that whatsoever Christ asks of God, God will give, but the deeper truth, that Christ Himself is the resurrection. Almightiness is in the good right hand of Him whom we summon to raise our dead. This we are to believe when we send for Him. Mark now how this point gets emphasis in this miracle of the raising of Lazarus. Remember, this is the miracle that Hnks itself closest with spiritual resurrection. Embosomed in the record of it is Christ's great, fathomless word, " I am the resurrection." And hence this is the miracle in which His power stands out conspicuous. There are other resurrections. The daughter of Jairus comes back to life ; but possibly that was a swoon, says unbelief. The son of the widow of Nain is made to rise from his bier ; but that, too, may have been a case of suspended animation, urges the doubter. Lazarus, however, has been dead four days — dead and buried. The case is to be signal. There shall be " no hinge or loop to hang a doubt on." Next to Christ's own resurrection, this is the miracle of power. " Take ye away the stone." " But Lord," says Martha, " by this time he stinketh." The revisers have done well to keep this old Saxon word. It is an element in the record adding to the proof of power. Suppose it be true that corruption is already there fastened on that dead body. " Take ye away the stone." Back corruption must go. The Lord of life is at the tomb.

The case is extreme, and we may well add, purposely extreme, that Christ's power over death may be put to the utmost possible proof And the point for faith is that there can be no case of a dead soul so bad, so dead in sin, so given over to corruption, as to be beyond the might of Christ's resurrection. This is one distinctive thing faith is to grasp in asking Jesus to raise our dead — that He is able. " Believest thou this ?"

The other distinctive thing is this : that He is willing. We have seen that the exceeding greatness of the mighty power of resurrection is with Jesus. Is there with Him also that other subtle, indispensable thing — sympathy ? We make bold to say the record of this miracle gives, and was meant to give, the most precious and questionless proof of it.

Mark the message itself by which these sisters summoned Jesus : " He whom Thou lovest is sick." We can say that, and be sure we are not going too far in saying it, when we send for Jesus to come and raise our dead. Does He not love those who are spiritually dead in our homes ? How was it with us when we were " dead in sins " ? Was it not His love for us that brought Him to our sepulchre ? Is it not our joyful and unbroken testimony that we love Him " because He first loved us " ? And did not His original unbribed love for the world that was dead, lead Him to that dreadful travail of death by which He was made " the resurrection and the life," so that now, whosoever, whosoever believeth in Him, shall never die ? See, too, how along the track of the record of this miracle the sympathy of Christ gets most special and tender mention, the signs and tokens being so varied and beautiful and affecting that the tomb of Lazarus, by consent of Christendom, has come to be the place where Christians oftenest go when they would see Jesus " touched with the feeling of our infirmities." Note His quick assurance to Martha, as if to relieve her troubled heart, " Thy brother shall rise again " ; and the deeper truth that follows. See how He " groaned in the spirit, and was troubled " when He saw the weeping of Mary and her friends. And who that reads the story does not feel that the sweetest juices and flowers in all God's garden of consolation have been brought together and made to yield their balm and fragrance in those two words, " Jesus wept " ? And if His cheeks were indeed wet with tears, and He groaned in the spirit, and His heart was full to weeping in the sympathy of sorrow as He came to answer the prayer of Martha and Mary ; and if He tied that bodily resurrection, with all its marv^elous setting. of power and tenderness, to the spiritual resurrection ; and if He is Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever; then the sympathy no less than the power, then that He is willing no less than that He is able, is a distinct thing that our faith is to take hold of when we ask Him to come and raise our beloved dead. Child of God, weeping at the sepulchre of some dear soul dead in sin, " believest thou this?"

(3) Effort was a third human antecedent in the miracle of the resurrection of Lazarus. Prayer and faith were not without " works." Jesus was not only sought and brought, but obeyed. " Take ye away the stone." And not until that stone was taken away by human hands did the divane quickening come to the dead.

But could not this Man who brought Lazarus from the sepulchre have brought him right through the ribbed rock ? Certainly He could. And " could not this Man who opened the eyes of him that was blind have caused that this man also should not die " ? Certainly. It was not a question of power in either case, but of wise and gracious design. The death of Lazurus was for the glory of God. But it is not to the glory of God for Him to do a thing that man could do. God never performs a superfluous work. He could raise crops without plow or harrow or sowing of seed, but let a Christian farmer, who believes in God and prays for a good crop, attempt to get a harvest by prayer and faith without " works," and see if God will stock his granaries ! If God has tied his blessing to any one law, it is to the law of the use of means. Search the Scriptures through, and not one instance will be found of God's doing a work that could be done by man. " How many loaves have ye?" "Five, Lord; but what are they to feed five thousand ?" No matter. It is in the use of the means at our command we find the miracle of enlargement and life. It is on the basis of the natural God builds the supernatural. " Work out your own salvation, . . . for it is God which worketh in you." " Take ye away the stone." If that had not been done we may fearlessly say Lazarus would not have been raised.

Now at the door of many a spiritual sepulchre there is a stone that needs to be taken away — a stone of doubt or indifference, a stone of prejudice or enmity, a stone of false security, a stone of lying refuge — some stone that human hands — your hands — may roll away from the door of the tomb, so as to make an open way for the power of Christ's resurrection. The power that can empty a sepulchre and thrill the dead with life, can certainly rive a stone at the mouth of the sepulchre, and cleave a way for the new-born soul through any refuge of lies or rock of offense. But it is not a question of power. It is a question on God's side of gracious design and wise command ; on man's side of trust and obedience. " Take ye away the stone," He says to Christian parents who have asked Him to raise their dead child. Something is to be done, and done by them, before Christ will work His work of resurrection. " Faith Cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word." And it may be Christ waits for that word to be spoken by these Christian parents before He will speak. Breaking the silence will then be " rolling away the stone " ? A tender, loving, urgent, faithful personal word from the heart of a mother to an impenitent son, from the heart of a teacher to a wayward scholar, from the heart of a wife to an unbelieving husband, may be the human antecedent for which God waits ere He bid the dead come forth,

" Lord, he hath been dead four days." That was the suggestion of Martha's unbelief. Her faith staggered at the command to take away the stone, in view of the time corruption had been allowed to do its work. But does not this scene often repeat itself at the sepulchres of the spiritually dead ? Jesus has been sent for by some believing mother. And all her heart has gone out in the message, " Lord, He whom Thou lovest is in the bonds of death." Her faith, too, has taken hold of the two specific things that faith must grasp. She beheves in the power and she beheves in the sympathy of Him who is the resurrection and the hfe. He has come in answer to her message and at the command of her faith. He is at the tomb of the dead soul. And He says to the weeping mother, " Take ye away the stone." " But Lord, he has been hardened by years of impenitency and unbelief He is embittered against the truth. I fear he will not brook a word concerning this matter of personal religion. I cannot speak to him." What is this but Martha's " Lord, he hath been dead four days." Surely the lesson is plain. The human antecedents of the work of God in salvation include the use of all appropriate, possible means. Prayer, faith, and effort are the triple obligation. We must send for Christ, believe in Christ, and obey Christ, if we would sing our joyful Easter song over the risen. Prayer, however importunate, and faith, however seemingly confident, if they shrink from possible service and halt at opportunity and neglect legitimate means, and turn away from any open door of influence, are leaving the stone at the door of the sepulchre. Who shall say how many sepulchres that now hold beloved dead would have been emptied long ago if those who wept and prayed there had taken away the stone !

II. The Divine Quickening. — Let us get back to Bethany and contemplate the next step in this miracle of the resurrection. It is the step of God — the fathomless mystery of life from death, the divine quickening. We have seen how Martha was staggered at the command of the Master to take away the stone. Listen now, every heart doubting and weeping at some spiritual sepulchre — listen, and see with what answering word Christ quiets Martha's fears and dissipates her doubt! " Said I not unto thee, that, if thou believedst, thou shouldest see the glory of God ?" And the record is, " So they took away the stone." And now the human antecedents — the prayer, the faith, the effort — are complete. These can no farther go. There is no more that they can do. The case is between Christ and the dead. Will He prove Himself indeed the resurrection and the life? He breaks the silence of that just-opened tomb. And more : He pierces the deeper silence beyond. Back into life He summons the body; back into the body He summons (from what world, who can tell ?) the immortal spirit. " Lazarus, come forth." And he that was dead is alive again, and comes forth, the hving proof that the Lord of hfe and death is at that sepulchre's door. This is the divine quickening. It is instant, immediate, personal, absolute, exclusive of everything human, calling for no intervention or adjunct, and allowing none. The process, the method, how corruption is spoiled of its prey and the dead Lazarus is made alive, we know not. One thing we know — the tomb is empty, and there stands the living Lazarus.

How like this is to the divine quickening in the spiritual resurrection ! Prayer must be offered, faith must be exercised, every possible influence must be brought to bear — Jesus must be sought and brought and obeyed — we must send for Him if we would have any power of resurrection wrought, we must believe that He is able and willing to raise the dead, we must take away the stone from the door of the sepulchre ; but we reach a point in every case where it is between Christ and the dead alone — no human hand to help, no word from our lips, no intervention of prayer or faith or instrument of any sort, but the immediate, instant, and almighty power of the Spirit of God on a dead soul, thrilling it at once and for ever with the power of an endless life. We cannot explain it. We cannot understand it. To be born out of this death in sin into this Hfe with Christ by the Holy Spirit of God is the profoundest of mysteries. The method, the process, we know not. But the fact we know. There is the vacant tomb. And there is the hving Lazarus. And there are the two sisters with the tears still in their eyes, but the glory shining through, saying, " This, our brother, was dead, and is alive again ; and was lost, and is found."

III. The Human Co7iscque7it. — Is the process complete? No. There is just one more step in the scene of this resurrection. " Loose him, and let him go." This is the human consequent of the divine quickening. Lazarus "came forth, bound hand and foot with grave-clothes : and his face was bound about with a napkin." Surely Christ, by His lightning word, could have torn those cerements of the tomb to shreds. What were they, compared to death's bands ! But death's bands could only be loosed by God. These grave-bands any man could unfasten. And so Christ's command is, " Loose him, and let him go."

Here, again, we have apt and striking illustration of what is true in spiritual resurrection. When a soul dead in trespasses and sins is made alive in Christ Jesus it is still bound by a great deal that belonged to that dead past. God plants life, and hence resurrection. But God does not change outward conditions, and hence the cerements of old habit and old association are still wound round and round that risen soul. It is wrapped in the grave-clothes of silence and ignorance. It is tongue-tied and foot-bound and handpinioned, unfitted yet for the toil and song and high liberty of Christian discipleship. Oh, how many risen Lazarus's there are that have never been loosed and let go by the Christian Church ! They have come forth out of their graves ; they can no longer be numbered among the dead ; they show the signs of resurrection, but there they are, largely useless to the church, dumb Lazarus's, "bound hand and foot with grave-clothes." They may like to hear, but they do not "love to tell, the old, old story"; and they could not tell it if they liked, for their faces are " bound about with a napkin."

The duty is clear and imperative. Divine quickening should have this human consequent. Resurrection should be followed by loosening. To see a living soul tied about with these trappings of the tomb is a gross unseemliness. It is robbing the Church of efficiency. It is lessening the power of a witnessing discipleship. It is binding feet that should be running in the way of God's commandment. It is silencing tongues that should be eloquent with unrestrained and loving speech.

" Loose him, and let him go " is Christ's command to the living whenever the dead arise. Be swift, O Church of God, to help each newly risen soul that comes forth from the sepulchre of sin ! By instruction, by encouragement, by sympathy, by counsel, by new association, by judicious stimulus, by incitement to service, by removal of hindrance, loose him ! Let the resurrection life have resurrection liberty. Then, indeed, will each resurrection scene be complete. Human antecedents on the one side ; human consequent on the other ; in the midst, Jesus only. At the initiation, prayer, faith, effort — human agency — "Take ye away the stone." At the conclusion, still further effort — human agency — " Loose him, and let him go." At the supreme, central, transcendent moment, nothing but the exceeding greatness of the mighty power of God — " Lazarus, come forth."

Ill

THE WORD OF GOD AS A CHARACTER-BUILDER

Ill

THE WORD OF GOD AS A CHARACTER-BUILDER

" And the word of God abideth in you." — I John ii. 14.

This age is robust. It is marked by a prevalent study of force. Athleticism is having its say in all realms, and with a will. Weakness is deemed ignoble — almost a crime. Young men of to-day and young women, too, are fairly assaulted with the idea that they must get a great deal of vigorous, tenacious fiber into their character, or go to the wall. And the suspicion is abroad, lurking secretly in many minds, openly avowed by others, that the Christian religion is not equal to the emergency; that Christianity does not furnish the stuff the character for our times needs to be made of Let us look at this matter. It will be doing good service to vindicate the Bible to intelligent judgment as a formative force in character. Our theme is, the Bible as a character-builder.

If a ballot were taken, asking any given number of men or women of average intelligence to

52 FROM LOVE TO PFL\ISE

name the elements that go to make up the noblest character, there would probably be considerable diversity' of reply. But, without a doubt, the great body of them would include, in one or another form of statement, at least these three elements : Heartiness, Fixedness, Aggressiveness. If to these three were added three others — viz., the Courage of Repose, the Power of Reser\'e, and Self-sacrifice, we should have a fairly full list of qualities for fine character-building.

Physical force is not named in this category, for, while that is a good thing to have, it is a brute thing, and often associated with meanness and cowardice. Character pertains to spirit, not to muscle. As a base and instrument for exploits, too much cannot be said in favor of physical force. But, after all you have said of it, you have scarcely touched the hem of the garment of real character. See the morning papers chronicHng the universit}' boat-race or football game of the day before, voicing their eulog}^ after this fashion : " Muscle has won and won in gallant style." " It was beef, ample, well-trained beef, overmatching younger stuff, equally well trained and far better coached, but there was not so much of it." Surely an ideal character is not to be characterized as " beef" So we leave out physical force.

Physical courage is not named as an element of character, for that every^ bulldog has. Moral courage is not named, for that interpenetrates the whole group of desirable qualities, and is comprehended in each and all.

I. Heartiness. — Say what we will about the glory of the intellect, after all, the heart is the man. Call the roll of deeds that have made the world ring with applause, and you will find it was the heart behind them that put into the deeds their immortal quality. The seal of ]\Iartin Luther represented a rose; and in the rose a heart; and in the heart a cross ; symbolizing this — that a fragrant and beautiful life, the rose, is born of love, the heart, spending itself in sacrifice, the cross. Whitefield's seal had as a device a winged heart soaring above the clouds. And the men of truly heroic mold, the men of great achievement, the men that have lifted multitudes of their fellows to higher altitudes of joy and sweet peace, that have sprung to the leadership of imperiled causes, and carried them for God and truth, have always been men of the winged heart.