The beauty of Immanuel : His name shall be called Wonderful

Preface

The great saving truths of the gospel ought to be none the less attractive because they are old and familiar. They are indeed only the more precious because so many human hearts through all ages have believed them, and drawn consolation from them in life and in death. The story of the cross can never lose its interest or its power in a world of sin and death; and increasing millions every day bear witness to the truth of the prediction — " T, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto myself."

The present volume is but one among the thousand attempts which have been made, and to the end of time, will continue to be made, to unfold the beauties of Immanuel, and to show forth that attractive power by which he draws a dying world to himself. No mortal pen is adequate to such a task. And yet it is permitted, even to the humblest, to approach, to behold, to admire, and then to tell, at least something of his glory. It is in the person and character of Immanuel, that we find the very essence of our faith. He is himself faith's great and allsatisfying object. We tell the story of salvation just as we tell of Jesus — the facts of his life, death, sufferings,

4 PREFACE.

instructions, resurrection, and ascension to glory. We hope for life and glory beyond the grave only in proportion as our faith can rest on him.

With such convictions the writer has approached this matchless theme, and has studied to unfold it, not in the lights of speculation and fancy, but only in that clear and sacred light which shines from the inspired pages. He would seek to commend to every dying fellow man, the personal character of the Redeemer, as infinitely the most lovely and attractive object that was ever revealed to the contemplation of the human mind. But while commending it thus as containing our only possible hope of salvation, he has sought to present it in no other way than as it has been revealed to us by those who " beheld his glory, the glory as of the Only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth/'

Chapter I. The Life And Character Of Jesus Christ

From all the characters portrayed in the Bible or exemplified in human history, it is a sublime ascent to that of Jesus Christ. In a former volume* it has been our aim to trace the streams of holy influence, so grand and beautiful, as they flowed forth over all the ancient world, in the lives of heroes and sages, kings and statesmen, prophets and apostles. We must now rise to the fountain head. We have been gazing on the stars of the greater and the lesser magnitudes, as for four thousand years they rose and set in the mighty firmament ; we must now behold the bright beams of the Sun of Righteousness, as he rises to set no more, in the clear and perfect day of a finished apocalypse. All that was lovely and of good report in these diversified characters of four thousand years, was but a preparation of the mind

* " Life Pictures from the Bible."

of man for the unfolding of that one perfect character, to which they all in a manner pointed, and from which they had in fact by anticipation borrowed all their brightness. For it is not more certain that human hearts began to be inspired with elevating hopes by that first promise in Eden of a Saviour to come, than it is that human character began to be moulded to forms of greatness and beauty by the conception, dim and shadowy as it may have been at first, of God manifest in the flesh. So that we must regard the character of Immanuel, not only as sending down its influences over the eighteen centuries that have followed, but as throwing back its rays to the very gates of the primeval paradise, and giving a brighter glow to every saintly and heroic character that adorned the patriarchal and prophetic ages.

They all rejoiced to see his day, though afar off: and they were enabled to shine as lights in a dark world, because they were themselves illuminated by faith in a God incarnate — even that glorious living Redeemer of whom Job spoke, who should stand in the latter day upon the earth.

Regarded simply in a literary and historical point of view, the character of Jesus of Nazareth is the wonder and the study of all ages. Regarded only in that light, it would be the greatest enigma that ever appeared in the annals of man. Taking his life and actions as recorded in the New Testament, and looking upon him merely as we would any other

LIFE AND CHARACTER OF JESUS CHRIST. 9

historical personage, aside from any claim to a supernatural mission and a Divine nature ; we have both a career and a character, to which there is nothing in the past history of our race that affords the slightest parallel, and for which nothing in any of the known elements of human nature offers the slightest solution. It is not only unique and original: it is infinitely the most unique and original thing that has ever been seen on earth. It is such an originality, as the forty centuries which went before, though constantly foretelling it, never produced; and the eighteen that have followed, have never found a duplicate. In the progress of nearly six thousand years, it has appeared but once ; and with all man's improvement and vaunted approaches to perfection, there is not the slightest probability that it will ever appear again, until He shall appear according to his promise. It is not more certain, that there is one God only over universal nature, than it is, that there is but one Jesus Christ in all history. Simply as a man, he stands at an infinite distance from every other man of our race: even as the Bible says, "holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners."

It is said that the great masters of painting and statuary, in embodying their highest conception of perfection in the "human form divine," do not take the idea from any one living man, but from a thousand different subjects — combining the beauty and the strength and all the manly virtues of each, into onQ symmetrica] and glorious form. But the character of Jesus Christ was not the result of any such combination as this. It is most true that it was gradually unfolded in all the prophecies, through a period of four thousand years, brighter and brighter glimpses of it being caught from age to age, and even impersonated in those great characters which typified his own ; but then it was not unfolded by man working upon man, and adding the excellences of a Cicero to those of a Socrates, or even the higher virtues of a Moses to those of a Paul, but by God himself revealing a pattern of moral beauty from the skies, and thus giving the world assurance of a style of humanity, which had otherwise never been known to man. For certain it is, that the great masters of this world's wisdom, who through sixty centuries have been working upon man outside of the Bible, and independently as they think of its aid, have never, by any blending of the virtues of the great, or otherwise, produced even in fiction, such a character as the Christ of the old Testament prophets, and the Christ of the New Testament history.

But it is not merely in a literary and historical point of view, that wx now propose to contemplate his wonderful character. It is in the full light of all the Scriptures, both of the Old Testament and the New, that we must estimate his character. We are not at liberty to ignore any part of the work and revelation of God. If we admit the Christ of

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history at all, we must admit the whole Christ of revelation. The moment we behold the veritable living man Christ Jesus, we are bound to recognize and adore all that belonged to him and marked him as something more than a man. His whole character — his whole-august and mysterious nature, human and divine — stands before us as distinctly in the Bible, as any living personage was ever revealed to the eyes or the conceptions of men. It is Jesus Immanuel who is the burden of all the Scriptures. It is not one like Abraham, or Moses, or David, or Daniel, or John the Baptist: but one, the latchet of whose shoes they were not worthy to unloose : not a helpless sinner of our race like the greatest of these, but one who is the Saviour of every sinner of the race who will trust in him : one, dwelling indeed in human form, like unto his brethren the sons of men, but in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. If it is the child of Bethlehem, the son of Joseph, the man of Nazareth, the sufferer of Calvary, who is called Jesus ; let us not forget that it is the Wonderful, the Counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace, who is called Jesus. And we can no more set aside one class of the facts than we can the other. If we take the human and reject the Divine, or take the Divine and reject the human, we do it at our peril; for in either case we reject the testimony of God concerning his Son, and the only offer of God for our salvation.

Now it is remarkable, that the proofs of the humanity and the Divinity of Jesus Christ are not only alike full and explicit in the Scriptures, but they are everywhere mingled together in exact proportions, and stated in precisely similar terms. If there is any point which is made plain, and guarded against the ingenuity and sophisms of unbelief, it would seem to be this. How do we know that Jesus of Nazareth was a man ? By his being called a man, and exercising all the functions, attributes, and works of man. He is called the man of sorrows, the son of man, the child born — born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, crucified, dead, and buried. He eats, drinks, walks, sleeps, feels, thinks, suffers, and dies as a man ; and therefore he is a man. And how do we know he is God ? Precisely in the same way. He is called God, wears all the titles of God — the Mighty God — does all the works of God — assumes all the attributes of God — receives from men and angels in earth and heaven, the very worship of God. He is conceived of the Holy Ghost, announced at his birth as the Saviour of the world, attested from heaven as the Son of God, condemned to death for making himself God ; raised from the dead, justified by the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory as God manifest in the flesh. He speaks, acts, lives, reigns, and triumphs over all as God ; and therefore he is God.

LIFE AND CHARACTER OF JESUS CHRIST. 13

Following the method hitherto pursued in all our illustrations of Bible characters, which is to let them speak and act for themselves as near as we can in the very terms of the sacred oracles, let us now address ourselves to this last and highest task — which is to set forth a brief but comprehensive outline of the life and the adorable character of Immanuel. And may the Spirit of all truth fill our hearts and minds with some measure of that conception of it which inspired the undertaking of the beloved disciple when he said, " The word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.' ' 2

Chapter II. His Birth And Early History

We need not stop to recite here the wonderful story of Bethlehem, which is so familiar to every child. Perhaps nothing in all the Bible is so universally known. The shepherds watching their flocks by night, the angel from heaven declaring his birth that day, the multitude of the heavenly host praising God in the highest, the star pointing out his birth-place, the wise men from the East seeking to find him, the babe lying in the manger at Bethlehem, the gold, frankincense, and myrrh offered to him, the cruel edict of King Herod, the warnings from God to the wise men and to Joseph, the presentation of the child to the Lord in the temple at Jerusalem, the timely flight into Egypt, and the safe return to Nazareth — all this we have heard from our lisping infancy. But though it has been told ten thousand thousand times, it shall never lose its graphic power and beauty as a narrative, nor its interest as the opening chapter in the scheme of God's salvation. It stands just where it ought to stand on the introductory pages of the New Testament. It is the pure and crystal fountain, spark-

HIS BIRTH AND EARLY HISTORY. 15

ling with the waters of immortal life for man, out of which the life of the Son of God on earth is to flow, and to which all nations shall come to drink. Since the creation of Adam no human life had ever had so wonderful a beginning. And now at the distance of eighteen centuries and a half, there is to us as deep an interest in it, as to those who first received the glad tidings, " Unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Saviour who is Christ the Lord,'* and heard the song of an innumerable host above, " Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth, and good will to men."

It was the fulfilment of those deep prophecies of Isaiah, which for eight centuries hitherto had found no adequate solution. " Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given ; and the government shall be upon his shoulder." It was the beginning of the fulfilment of that still more ancient oracle which had come down from the garden of Eden. "The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." Loud and fierce has been the outcry which modern infidelity has raised against this simple and unvarnished narrative of our Lord's conception and nativity, in the opening pages of the New Testament. But we submit that such a conception and nativity as this is precisely the thing which the ancient prophecies called for, and without which those prophecies, not only never have been, but never can be fulfilled.

16 THE BEAUTY OF IMMANTTEL.

And we submit again, that on the supposition that those prophecies had a meaning in them and were ever to be fulfilled at all, by one who was Immanuel, God with us, God incarnate, God manifest in the flesh, the account of our Saviour's birth in the New Testament, as one made of a woman, "conceived by the Holy Ghost, and born of the virgin Mary," is not only a true and exact fulfilment, but one which commends itself to our reason as eminently befitting all the conditions and possibilities of the case. It is precisely what we should expect to occur, and precisely the manner in which we should say it ought to occur, if the prophecies of four thousand years are ever to be verified in fact, and the Deity is ever to be arrayed in mortal flesh. Given the fact of an incarnation of the Divine nature, and then the fact, that the incarnate one is to be a virgin-born child, and a real man with a true body and a reasonable soul like ourselves; and what other plan will our worldly wise philosophy devise for its accomplishment more worthy of God's infinite wisdom and man's belief, than the one recorded by Matthew and Luke ? " This is the Lord's doing and it is marvellous in our eyes." But so far from discrediting the New Testament as given of God, it is a confirmation of it ; because it corresponds to every conception of the Messiah as revealed in the Old Testament; and its very unlikeness to anything that man could have done, or would have invented, is a voucher of its truth. A

HIS BIRTH AND EARLY HISTORY. 17

Divine religion, conscious of the truth of God, could unfearingly go forth with that high and marvellous mystery on its very forehead. A false religion, as our sensitive and shame-faced unbelief shows, would have shrunk with scorn from inventing such a story, supposing it to be a fiction, and still more from the shame of telling it, supposing it to be a fact. That the Evangelists have told it, not only without fear or shrinking, but with exultation and joy, and that, upon the very face of their sacred books, and in the eyes of a proud and incredulous world, is itself a demonstration that it is not of men, but of God.

It was in the reign of Caesar Augustus, the Roman emperor, that this great event took place. It was a time of peace over all the world — fit time for the advent of him who was the Prince of Peace. The temple of Janus at Rome, after the ceaseless conflict of ages, was now closed, as indicative that the world was at peace: and the temple at Jerusalem, spared by the haughty invader, was still open for that morning and evening sacrifice, which had so long foreshadowed "the Lamb of God, that should take away the sin of the world. The very fulness of time had come — the prophecies all ripe for fulfilment, the Jewish nation looking for its deliverer, the world at large full of expectation, and the preparation of four thousand years now completed. Thus at the precise point of time, and at the proper place, at Bethlehem of Judah, and of David's royal 2 * line, glorious still though in obscurity, and of a virgin mother overshadowed by the Holy Ghost, and under outward circumstances of deepest humiliation combined with others of unearthly grandeur, was Jesus the Messiah born. It is no marvel to us that a child thus born should be a wonder and a study to all who saw him and heard of him — that his kinswoman Elizabeth and his virgin mother and the no longer incredulous iJacharias, should be filled with the Holy Ghost and utter songs of joy at his birth, that the shepherds should go home glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, that sages from the farthest east should come to worship and adore him, that the guilty Herod should be conscious that the rightful claimant of his throne was born, that the aged Simeon and Anna waiting at the temple for the consolation of Israel, as soon as they beheld him, should rejoice, and say, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace according to thy word, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation," and that Joseph and his mother should deeply ponder all these things in their hearts. Had Abraham who rejoiced to see his day, and the dying Jacob who told of his descent from Judah, and Isaiah who spake of his glory, and Micah who marked his birth-place, and Daniel who designated the time, been there, they too, like Simeon and Anna, would have felt that it was enough — this is the Son of the Highest, the

HIS BIRTH AND EARLY HISTORY. 19

Prince of the house of David, the glory of Israel, and a light to lighten the Gentiles.

From these scenes of his early infancy, until he was twelve years old, the sacred record is almost entirely silent. After his presentation in the temple, the flight into Egypt, and the return to Nazareth on the death of Herod, our only information is that "the child grew and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him." But this is enough to show he was preparing for his great life work. We know that his parents neglected nothing within their powder, for we are told that they did all things according to the law, and were accustomed to go up every year to Jerusalem to attend the passover. After all that had been communicated both by the angel and the prophets of the Lord, and after all that she had herself spoken by the Holy Ghost, his mother would not fail to use every means of instruction in the sacred oracles, and to inculcate every lesson of early piety, that this child should be trained for his sublime mission as the Son of the Highest.

Accordingly the Evangelist Luke gives us one striking and beautiful incident, occurring at the age of twelve, to illustrate how during all this early period he had, indeed, waxed strong in spirit, filled with celestial wisdom and grace divine.

His parents, whom he had accompanied to Jerusalem were returning from the great annual feast in the caravan of their kinsfolk and acquaintance.

Unknown to them Jesus had tarried behind. Missing him, but supposing that he was safe in the company, (for, doubtless, all knew him and felt an interest in so extraordinary a child,) they went a day's journey, and then turned back in search of him. It was not until after three days that they found him. He was in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them and asking them questions. And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers. Mary and Joseph were amazed : and she said, " Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us ? Behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.' 7 And he said, "How is it that ye sought me ? Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business ?" They did not fully comprehend his answer ; but, as if to show that it was in no spirit of disobedience to them, his earthly parents, that he had acted thus, it is added, " He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them. But his mother kept all these sayings in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man."

Chapter III. His Baptism And Public Ministry

When our Saviour had reached the age of thirty, the time of life at which the Jewish priests were accustomed to enter upon their public functions, conscious that it became him to fulfil all righteousness under that dispensation in which he was born, and that the hour was at hand for him to be made manifest to Israel as the Messiah, and to enter publicly upon the discharge of all the offices of that great work for w T hich he had come into the world, he left Nazareth and came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness of Judea, to be baptized of him. John, surrounded by the ten thousands of Israel, was on the banks of the Jordan, whither he had gone to preach the baptism of repentance, and to fulfil his own high mission, as the voice of one crying in the wilderness, and the messenger who should prepare the way of the Lord before him. Knowing that this was the immaculate Son of the Highest, and that, as such, he could have no need of that baptism of repentance which he was sent to preach, John, at first refused to administer the ordinance to him. But being admonished that it was necessary in order to fulfil all the requirements of the law, he suffered it to be so, and thus publicly in the eyes of Israel, and in virtue of his own prophetic and priestly office, administered that solemn rite which marks the era of the Messiah's introduction into his public ministry, and to which he himself was accustomed to appeal as the very seal of authority, when the Jews disputed his legal rights in the temple.

As a public inauguration of his ministry, nothing could be more appropriate and imposing than this baptism. A king in virtue of his being of David's royal line, a prophet and a priest in virtue of his being anointed by the Holy Ghost, and now publicly designated by John, he had both the testimony of earth and heaven, that he was the Messiah. John saw and bare record that this is the Son of God ; crying to the thousands of Israel, "Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world." And he had a far higher testimony than John's, even that of the Father and the Holy Ghost. That august attestation is recorded in the following words: " Now when all the people were baptized (a people thus prepared for the Lord), it came to pass, that Jesus also being baptized and praying, the heaven was opened unto him. And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape, like a dove, upon him, and a voice came from heaven which said, Thou art my beloved Son ; in thee I am well pleased."

TI1113 attested and honoured by God and man, thus endowed plentifully with all Divine and human gifts, thus consecrated and anointed to the sublimest mission ever known to man, thus publicly proclaimed to Israel by his great forerunner, and thus, while the dew of youth was fresh upon him, and all the strength of opening manhood bounded in his veins, did Jesus Immanuel begin his work.

His first great work was one of conflict. Its arena was in the unseen and spiritual world. He had come to destroy the works of the Devil ; to repair the evils which he had wrought, to atone for the guilt which man through him had incurred. He had undertaken for man — he had come to be God's Advocate and man's Redeemer. And so the battle began with the powers of the darkness of this world — a struggle for the mastery between the incarnate Son of God, and him who, from the beginning, had been God's adversary and man's enemy. Crowned with all the glories of his recent baptism, strong in the confidence of God's favour, and full of the Holy Ghost, our blessed Lord is led away by the spirit that was upon him, not to the abodes of men, but to the deep solitudes of the wilderness, there to meet the enemy of our souls, there to be tempted of the devil. And there, single-handed and alone, amid fastings and hungerings which no mortal flesh but his could have endured, for forty days he wrestles with the prince of the power of the air, the god of this world. We shall not stay to depict the various changes of the solemn scene, as it is detailed by the evangelists. Brief as the sacred record is, and short as was its period of forty days, it has furnished the ground work of Milton's second great epic, Paradise Regained. And when that conflict was ended, and from every assault of the tempter, the Son of God had come off a conqueror, the gifted bard represents the great battle as fought, the victory won, the tempter foiled, lost Paradise restored, and " Eden raised in the waste wilderness/' But this is certainly a great misconception of the work of Christ. The work was not finished, nor the great conflict ended with the forty days in the wilderness. It was but just begun, to be renewed and perpetuated through his whole earthly career. And so with deep significance, one of the Evangelists tells us, that "when the devil had ended all the temptations, he departed from him for a season.' ' And then angels came and ministered unto him.

But this first great conflict being past, the next scene of his labours was among men. He had a work of love to do among men, as well as a war to wage with the devil. Hence we follow him from the wilderness as he returns in the power of the Spirit into Galilee ; preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing all manner of diseases among the people. Through all the cities, and in all the synagogues of Galilee, the great burden of his message is, "The time is fulfilled, the kingdom of

HIS BAPTISM AND PUBLIC xMINISTRY. 25

heaven is at hand ; repent ye and believe the gospel." When entreated by the people in one place not to depart from them, he replies, "I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also ; for therefore am I sent." And with such words of power and wisdom, grace and truth, did he preach, that the people were everywhere astonished at his doctrine, and followed him from city to city and even into the deserts to attend upon his extraordinary ministry. Among the important opening acts of this public ministry, he called and ordained his twelve disciples, that they might be with him to receive his instructions in all the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, and that he might send them forth likewise to preach the gospel to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. It was also at an early stage of this ministry, that he went back to Nazareth where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day read in their synagogue that remarkable passage from Isaiah which was then accomplished in himself, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord." And, as he said unto them, "This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears, they all bare him witness, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth."