Quiet Talks on Following the Christ

by S. D. Gordon

I remember distinctly one night, years ago, in northern Missouri, a young woman waited at the close of a meeting with her friend. We talked and prayed together and she made the great decision. I can remember looking after the two as they went out, wondering to myself how much it meant to her. I could not judge from her demeanour. But the next night they were back again, and instantly I knew that it had meant much, everything, to her. The transfiguring peace was upon her face. I would have called her face plain the evening before. Now it was really beautiful in the sweet clear light shining out of it.

Two things stand out sharply in my memory of Ping Yang, in Korea. One is the visit to the home of a Christian family, whose head was one of those being held in prison in the famous conspiracy case. I still feel the pathos of face and voice as the dear old mother, and the gentle wife, asked so eagerly, "When will he be back?"

The other, was the faces of certain of the women in the church service there. I found myself time and again turning to look at their faces as I was speaking. There was a sweet light that transfigured their worn faces, and gave them a real beauty. It was the more striking against the background of the faces one sees in those Oriental lands.

The story has been told in various ways of the European artist sent to a Salvation Army meeting to make a caricature. He was an infidel, with a sinful life, an uneasy conscience, and a sore heart. But the faces he saw there of those redeemed out of the depths of sin, convinced him that they had what he needed, and what he afterwards got, at the same place as they, the feet of Christ. One who has looked into the faces at some of the Salvation Army meetings has no trouble believing the story.

Now this is part of our Master's great plan for reaching His world. He comes in to us, if we let Him. He changes us as we yield to Him. The beauty of this wondrous One within shines out of face and eyes, and touches those whom we touch. His presence transfigures when He is allowed to dominate. We are changed from within. Though like Moses and Stephen we will not wist of the transfiguration, only of the Great One whose presence within it is that makes the change. We know the peace and music within; others know more of the change in face and life.

Resurrection Power—A Present Experience.

There is a second experience in this group. In sharpest contrast with Jacob's tomb stands out the Resurrection Morning. Our Lord Jesus rose up out of death. The strongest bars that death could make—and surely every one of us has some sore experience of their strength in holding dear ones from us—those strongest bars were snapped, as a woman breaks the cotton thread in her sewing.

Our Lord Jesus rose up again into life, and into a new, a higher, a different sort of life. The personal identity was unchanged. His disciples recognized His voice and face and form, as they talked and ate with Him. But the limitations were gone. The control of spirit over body was complete.

And it is a bit of His gracious plan that we shall follow Him here, too. When He returns in glory there will be a resurrection for those who have followed Him. As He comes down on the clouds, the dead bodies of those who have the warm vital touch with Him, that the word "believeth" stands for, will be touched into a new life and be reunited with the spirits that had lived in them.

There will be a wondrous meeting in the air with Himself, and an equally wondrous reunion in His presence of those bound to us and to Him by ties of love. Our personal identity will be the same, loved ones instantly recognizing loved ones. But the bodies will be of a new sort, free of all the limitations and weaknesses of our earth life. And our Lord's return is peculiarly precious because it is the time of this change and reunion.