No wonder those who, on one occasion, were sent to lay hands on him had only this answer when they returned to their masters without him: “Never man spake like this man.”
CHAPTER IX.
THE SON OF MAN AND SIN.
When we compare the work Jesus proposed to do in the world with the schemes of earth’s greatest ones we cannot classify him with mere men.
What did he think he came into the world to do? What did he consider his mission to be?
We cannot be in the least doubt for the answer; there was no confusion in his thought, no ambiguity in his words. If we ask what Jesus thought his mission was we will easily find the answer—unparalleled by the thought of any, absolutely unique, stupendous, but as unmistakable in meaning as simple in the form of expression.
We will answer in his own words: “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which is lost.” “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” “God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.” “I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.” More forcibly, if possible, than in his words, his conception of his mission is shown by his work, his living, and his dying. St. Luke, in the Acts of the Apostles, gives us in a simple statement the whole history; it is, in a line, the biography of the God-man, “He went about doing good.”
That Jesus should have seen in the world evil that needed to be remedied, that he should have tried to remedy the evil he saw, does not, in itself, difference him from good and wise men who have observed the facts of human life and have deplored human miseries. All the great teachers and reformers have recognized evil in the world, and many of them have distinctly recognized this evil as moral evil. The doctrine of Jesus is peculiar in this; all the evil that is in the world is moral evil, and all moral evil is, at its root, sin, and sin, considered as a quality in man’s character, is a state of being that is out of harmony with God; considered as a fact, it is life in violation of God’s law. The bad man is, in his spirit, at enmity with God; in his life he breaks God’s law. He loves evil because evil is in him; his life is wicked because his heart is bad.
And Jesus comes to take away sin; to deliver men from it, its penalty, and its power. Said the angel to Mary: “Thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins.”