If you look far north in the map of Palestine above the lake of Merom, near the snowy peaks of mount Hermon and Lebanon, you will see where this Refuge-city lies. Recent travellers describe its ruins as still standing on a rocky ridge in the midst of green hills, surrounded with the remains of forts and castles built by the Crusaders in the middle ages. It was situated within the tribe of Naphtali, and must have been it great town at the time when the old warrior Barak, who was born within its walls, marched from its gates to meet Sisera in the plain below with his nine hundred chariots of iron.
What does its name tell of Christ?
The Hebrew word Kedesh signifies “Holy.” Jesus was “The Holy One.” Not one stain of sin polluted His holy human nature. Angels in heaven, as they cast their crowns at His feet, cry, “Holy! holy! holy!”[12] Devils on earth were compelled to exclaim, “We know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God.”[13] Jewish priests, as they spake of Him of old by types, took “a lamb without blemish.”[14] Jewish prophets, as they spake of Him in their predictions, called Him “The Righteous (or Holy) Branch.”[15] Apostles, as they wrote about Him, said “He was HOLY, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners.”[16] When He was Himself on earth, He could challenge His bitterest foes, “Which of you convinceth me of sin?”[17] And when He came down, soon after His ascension, from His throne in the skies, we find Him proclaiming as His name, “He that is HOLY, He that is True!”[18]
Reader, remember this. Jesus never could have saved you unless He had been “glorious in holiness.” If He had had one sin in Him, you and I must have been lost for ever. Just as one leak in Noah's ark of old would have sunk it, so one leak of sin in Jesus, the true Ark, would have plunged us all in the depths of eternal despair. Let us, then, love often to walk round the walls of Kedesh, and think of our “City of Refuge” as “The Holy Child Jesus.”[19]
And when you ponder His holiness, seek to be holy, as He was. How He hated sin! How He loved to do His heavenly Father's will! How gentle, and good, and kind He was to all! He never was angry, or passionate, or revengeful. When a youth, at His early home in Nazareth, “He increased in favour with God and man.”[20] Be like Jesus in His holiness! Let KEDESH be a word written on your young hearts! Whenever you are in trouble or difficulty, or temptation, always ask, “How would the Holy Jesus have acted here?” Turn the words of your well-known hymn into a prayer. While you say—
“I love the NAME of Jesus,
Immanuel, Christ the Lord;
Like fragrance on the breezes,
His name abroad is pour'd;”—
seek also to add—
“I long to be like Jesus,
Meek, lowly, loving, mild;
I long to be like Jesus,
The Father's Holy Child!”
