Produced by Al Haines
Personal Friendships
of Jesus
BY
J. R. MILLER, D. D.
AUTHOR OF "SILENT TIMES," "MAKING THE MOST OF LIFE," "THINGS TO LIVE FOR," "BLESSING OF CHEERFULNESS," ETC.
One friend in that path shall be,
To secure my steps from wrong;
One to count night day for me,
Patient through the watches long,
Serving most with none to see.
BROWNING.
New York
THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO.
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1897,
BY THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY.
EIGHTH THOUSAND
PREFACE.
George MacDonald said in an address, "The longer I live, the more I am assured that the business of life is to understand the Lord Christ." If this be true, whatever sheds even a little light on the character or life of Christ is worth while.
Nothing reveals a man's heart better than his friendships. The kind of friend he is, tells the kind of man he is. The personal friendships of Jesus reveal many tender and beautiful things in his character. They show us also what is possible for us in divine friendship; for the heart of Jesus is the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever.
These chapters are only suggestive, not exhaustive. If they make the way into close personal friendship with Jesus any plainer for those who hunger for such blessed intimacy, that will be reward enough.
J. R. M.
PHILADELPHIA.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER
I. THE HUMANHEARTEDNESS OF JESUS II. JESUS AND HIS MOTHER III. JESUS AND HIS FORERUNNER IV. JESUS' CONDITIONS OF FRIENDSHIP V. JESUS CHOOSING HIS FRIENDS VI. JESUS AND THE BELOVED DISCIPLE VII. JESUS AND PETER VIII. JESUS AND THOMAS IX. JESUS' UNREQUITED FRIENDSHIPS X. JESUS AND THE BETHANY SISTERS XI. JESUS COMFORTING HIS FRIENDS XII. JESUS AND HIS SECRET FRIENDS XIII. JESUS' FAREWELL TO HIS FRIENDS XIV. JESUS' FRIENDSHIPS AFTER HE AROSE XV. JESUS AS A FRIEND
All I could never be,
All men ignored in me,
This I was worth to God.
BROWNING.
But lead me, Man divine,
Where'er Thou will'st, only that I may find
At the long journey's end Thy image there,
And grow more like to it. For art not Thou
The human shadow of the infinite Love
That made and fills the endless universe?
The very Word of Him, the unseen, unknown,
Eternal Good that rules the summer flower
And all the worlds that people starry space.
RICHARD WATSON GILDER.
THE FRIENDSHIPS OF JESUS.
CHAPTER I.
THE HUMANHEARTEDNESS OF JESUS.
O God, O kinsman loved, but not enough,
O man with eyes majestic after death,
Whose feet have toiled along our pathways rough,
Whose lips drawn human breath;
By that one likeness which is ours and thine,
By that one nature which doth hold us kin,
By that high heaven where sinless thou dost shine,
To draw us sinners in;
By thy last silence in the judgment hall,
By long foreknowledge of the deadly tree,
By darkness, by the wormwood and the gall,
I pray thee visit me.
JEAN INGELOW.
There is a natural tendency to think of Jesus as different from other men in the human element of his personality. Our adoration of him as our divine Lord makes it seem almost sacrilege to place his humanity in the ordinary rank with that of other men. It seems to us that life could not have meant the same to him that it means to us. It is difficult for us to conceive of him as learning in childhood as other children have to learn. We find ourselves fancying that he must always have known how to read and write and speak. We think of the experiences of his youth and young manhood as altogether unlike those of any other boy or young man in the village where he grew up. This same feeling leads us to think of his temptation as so different from what temptation is to other men as to be really no temptation at all.
So we are apt to think of all the human life of Jesus as being in some way lifted up out of the rank of ordinary experiences. We do not conceive of him as having the same struggles that we have in meeting trial, in enduring injury and wrong, in learning obedience, patience, meekness, submission, trust, and cheerfulness. We conceive of his friendships as somehow different from other men's. We feel that in some mysterious way his human life was supported and sustained by the deity that dwelt in him, and that he was exempt from all ordinary limiting conditions of humanity.
There is no doubt that with many people this feeling of reverence has been in the way of the truest understanding of Jesus, and ofttimes those who have clung most devoutly to a belief in his deity have missed much of the comfort which comes from a proper comprehension of his humanity.
Yet the story of Jesus as told in the Gospels furnishes no ground for any confusion on the subject of his human life. It represents him as subject to all ordinary human conditions excepting sin. He began life as every infant begins, in feebleness and ignorance; and there is no hint of any precocious development. He learned as every child must learn. The lessons were not gotten easily or without diligent study. He played as other boys did, and with them. The more we think of the youth of Jesus as in no marked way unlike that of those among whom he lived, the truer will our thought of him be.
Millais the great artist, when he was a young man, painted an unusual picture of Jesus. He represented him as a little boy in the home at Nazareth. He has cut his finger on some carpenter's tool, and comes to his mother to have it bound up. The picture is really one of the truest of all the many pictures of Jesus, because it depicts just such a scene as ofttimes may have been witnessed in his youth. Evidently there was nothing in his life in Nazareth that drew the attention of his companions and neighbors to him in any striking way. We know that he wrought no miracles until after he had entered upon his public ministry. We can think of him as living a life of unselfishness and kindness. There was never any sin or fault in him; he always kept the law of God perfectly. But his perfection was not something startling. There was no halo about his head, no transfiguration, that awed men. We are told that he grew in favor with men as well as with God. His religion made his life beautiful and winning, but always so simple and natural that it drew no unusual attention to itself. It was richly and ideally human.
So it was unto the end. Through the years of his public ministry, when his words and works burned with divine revealing, he continued to live an altogether natural human life. He ate and drank; he grew weary and faint; he was tempted in all points like as we are, and suffered, being tempted. He learned obedience by the things that he endured. He hungered and thirsted, never ministering with his divine power to any of his own needs. "In all things it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren."
In nothing else is this truth more clearly shown than in the humanheartedness which was so striking a feature of the life of Jesus among men. When we think of him as the Son of God, the question arises, Did he really care for personal friendships with men and women of the human family? In the home from which he came he had dwelt from all eternity in the bosom of the Father, and had enjoyed the companionship of the highest angels. What could he find in this world of imperfect, sinful beings to meet the cravings of his heart for fellowship? Whom could he find among earth's sinful creatures worthy of his friendship, or capable of being in any real sense his personal friend? What satisfaction could his heart find in this world's deepest and holiest love? What light can a dim candle give to the sun? Does the great ocean need the little dewdrop that hides in the bosom of the rose? What blessing or inspiration of love can any poor, marred, stained life give to the soul of the Christ?
Yet the Gospels abound with evidences that Jesus did crave human love, that he found sweet comfort in the friendships which he made, and that much of his keenest suffering was caused by failures in the love of those who ought to have been true to him as his friends. He craved affection, and even among the weak and faulty men and women about him made many very sacred attachments from which he drew strength and comfort.
We must distinguish between Christ's love for all men and his friendship for particular individuals. He was in the world to reveal the Father, and all the divine compassion for sinners was in his heart. It was this mighty love that brought him to earth on the mission of redemption. It was this that impelled and constrained him in all his seeking of the lost. He had come to be the Saviour of all who would believe and follow him. Therefore he was interested in every merest fragment or shred of life. No human soul was so debased that he did not love it.
But besides this universal divine love revealed in the heart of Jesus, he had his personal human friendships. A philanthropist may give his whole life to the good of his fellow-men, to their uplifting, their advancement, their education; to the liberation of the enslaved; to work among and in behalf of the poor, the sick, or the fallen. All suffering humanity has its interest for him, and makes appeal to his compassion. Yet amid the world of those whom he thus loves and wishes to help, this man will have his personal friends; and through the story of his life will run the golden threads of sweet companionships and friendships whose benedictions and inspirations will be secrets of strength, cheer, and help to him in all his toil in behalf of others.
Jesus gave all his rich and blessed life to the service of love. Power was ever going out from him to heal, to comfort, to cheer, to save. He was continually emptying out from the full fountain of his own heart cupfuls of rich life to reinvigorate other lives in their faintness and exhaustion. One of the sources of his own renewing and replenishing was in the friendships he had among men and women. What friends are to us in our human hunger and need, the friends of Jesus were to him. He craved companionship, and was sorely hurt when men shut their doors in his face.
There are few more pathetic words in the New Testament than that short sentence which tells of his rejection, "He came unto his own, and his own received him not." Another pathetic word is that which describes the neglect of those who ought to have been ever eager to show him hospitality: "The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head." Even the beasts of the field and the birds of the heaven had warmer welcome in this world than he in whose heart was the most gentle love that earth ever knew.
Another word which reveals the deep hunger of the heart of Jesus for friendship and companionship was spoken in view of the hour when even his own apostles would leave him: "Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone." The experience of the garden of Gethsemane also shows in a wonderful way the Lord's craving for sympathy. In his great sorrow he wished to have his best friends near him, that he might lean on them, and draw from their love a little strength for his hour of bitter need. It was an added element in the sorrow of that night that he failed to get the help from human sympathy which he yearned for and expected. When he came back each time after his supplication, he found his apostles sleeping.
These are some of the glimpses which we get in the Gospel story of the longing heart of Jesus. He loved deeply, and sought to be loved. He was disappointed when he failed to find affection. He welcomed love wherever it came to him,—the love of the poor, the gratitude of those whom he had helped, the trusting affection of little children. We can never know how much the friendship of the beloved disciple was to Jesus. What a shelter and comfort the Bethany home was to him, and how his strength was renewed by its sweet fellowship! How even the smallest kindnesses were a solace to his heart! How he was comforted by the affection and the ministries of the women-friends who followed him!
In the chapters of this book which follow, the attempt is made to tell the story of some of the friendships of Jesus, gathering up the threads from the Gospel pages. Sometimes the material is abundant, as in the case of Peter and John; sometimes we have only a glimpse or two in the record, albeit enough to reveal a warm and tender friendship, as in the case of the Bethany sisters, and of Andrew, and of Joseph. It may do us good to study these friendship stories. It will at least show us the humanheartedness of Jesus, and his method in blessing and saving the world. The central fact in every true Christian life is a personal friendship with Jesus. Men were called to follow him, to leave all and cleave to him, to believe on him, to trust him, to love him, to obey him; and the result was the transformation of their lives into his own beauty. That which alone makes one a Christian is being a friend of Jesus. Friendship transforms—all human friendship transforms. We become like those with whom we live in close, intimate relations. Life flows into life, heart and heart are knit together, spirits blend, and the two friends become one.
We have but little to give to Christ; yet it is a comfort to know that our friendship really is precious to him, and adds to his joy, poor and meagre though its best may be—but he has infinite blessings to give to us. "I call you friends." No other gift he gives to us can equal in value the love and friendship of his heart. When Cyrus gave Artabazus, one of his courtiers, a gold cup, he gave Chrysanthus, his favorite, only a kiss. And Artabazus said to Cyrus, "The cup you gave me was not so good gold as the kiss you gave Chrysanthus." No good man's money is ever worth so much as his love. Certainly the greatest honor of this earth, greater than rank or station or wealth, is the friendship of Jesus Christ. And this honor is within the reach of every one. "Henceforth I call you not servants … I have called you friends." "Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you."
The stories of the friendships of Jesus when he was on the earth need cause no one to sigh, "I wish that I had lived in those days, when Jesus lived among men, that I might have been his friend too, feeling the warmth of his love, my life enriched by contact with his, and my spirit quickened by his love and grace!" The friendships of Jesus, whose stories we read in the New Testament, are only patterns of friendships into which we may enter, if we are ready to accept what he offers, and to consecrate our life to faithfulness and love.
The friendship of Jesus includes all other blessings for time and for eternity. "All things are yours, and ye are Christ's." His friendship sanctifies all pure human bonds—no friendship is complete which is not woven of a threefold cord. If Christ is our friend, all life is made rich and beautiful to us. The past, with all of sacred loss it holds, lives before us in him. The future is a garden-spot in which all life's sweet hopes, that seem to have perished on the earth, will be found growing for us.
"Fields of the past to thee shall be no more
The burialground of friendships once in bloom,
But the seed-plots of a harvest on before,
And prophecies of life with larger room
For things that are behind.
Live thou in Christ, and thy dead past shall be
Alive forever with eternal day;
And planted on his bosom thou shall see
The flowers revived that withered on the way
Amid the things behind."
CHAPTER II.
JESUS AND HIS MOTHER.
Sleep, sleep, mine Holy One!
My flesh, my Lord!—what name? I do not know
A name that seemeth not too high or low,
Too far from me or heaven.
My Jesus, that is best!
* * *
Sleep, sleep, my saving One.
MRS. BROWNING.
The first friend a child has in this world is its mother. It comes here an utter stranger, knowing no one; but it finds love waiting for it. Instantly the little stranger has a friend, a bosom to nestle in, an arm to encircle it, a hand to minister to its helplessness. Love is born with the child. The mother presses it to her breast, and at once her heart's tendrils twine about it.
It is a good while before the child becomes conscious of the wondrous love that is bending over it, yet all the time the love is growing in depth and tenderness. In a thousand ways, by a thousand delicate arts, the mother seeks to waken in her child a response to her own yearning love. At length the first gleams of answering affection appear—the child has begun to love. From that hour the holy friendship grows. The two lives become knit in one.
When God would give the world a great man, a man of rare spirit and transcendent power, a man with a lofty mission, he first prepares a woman to be his mother. Whenever in history we come upon such a man, we instinctively begin to ask about the character of her on whose bosom he nestled in infancy, and at whose knee he learned his life's first lessons. We are sure of finding here the secret of the man's greatness. When the time drew nigh for the incarnation of the Son of God, we may be sure that into the soul of the woman who should be his mother, who should impart her own life to him, who should teach him his first lessons, and prepare him for his holy mission, God put the loveliest and the best qualities that ever were lodged in any woman's life. We need not accept the teaching that exalts the mother of Jesus to a place beside or above her divine Son. We need have no sympathy whatever with the dogma that ascribes worship to the Virgin Mary, and teaches that the Son on his throne must be approached by mortals through his more merciful, more gentle-hearted mother. But we need not let these errors concerning Mary obscure the real blessedness of her character. We remember the angel's greeting, "Blessed art thou among women." Hers surely was the highest honor ever conferred upon any woman.
"Say of me as the Heavenly said, 'Thou art
The blessedest of women!'—blessedest,
Not holiest, not noblest,—no high name,
Whose height misplaced may pierce me like a shame,
When I sit meek in heaven!"
We know how other men, men of genius, rarely ever have failed to give to their mothers the honor of whatever of greatness or worth they had attained. But somehow we shrink from saying that Jesus was influenced by his mother as other good men have been; that he got from her much of the beauty and the power of his life. We are apt to fancy that his mother was not to him what mothers ordinarily are to their children; that he did not need mothering as other children do; that by reason of the Deity indwelling, his character unfolded from within, without the aid of home teaching and training, and the other educational influences which do so much in shaping the character of children in common homes.
But there is no Scriptural ground for this feeling. The humanity of Jesus was just like our humanity. He came into the world just as feeble and as untaught as any other child that ever was born. No mother was ever more to her infant than Mary was to Jesus. She taught him all his first lessons. She gave him his first thoughts about God, and from her lips he learned the first lispings of prayer. Jewish mothers cared very tenderly for their children. They taught them with unwearying patience the words of God. One of the rabbis said, "God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers." This saying shows how sacred was the Jewish thought of the mother's work for her child.
Every true mother feels a sense of awe in her soul when she bends over her own infant child; but in the case of Mary we may be sure that the awe was unusual, because of the mystery of the child's birth. In the annunciation the angel had said to her, "That which is to be born shall be called holy, the Son of God." Then the night of her child's birth there was a wondrous vision of angels, and the shepherds who beheld it hastened into the town; and as they looked upon the baby in the manger, they told the wondering mother what they had seen and heard. We are told that Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart. While she could not understand what all this meant, she knew at least that hers was no common child; that in some wonderful sense he was the Son of God.
This consciousness must have given to her motherhood an unusual thoughtfulness and seriousness. How close to God she must have lived! How deep and tender her love must have been! How pure and clean her heart must have been kept! How sweet and patient she must have been as she moved about at her tasks, in order that no harsh or bitter thought or feeling might ever cast a shadow upon the holy life which had been intrusted to her for training and moulding.
Only a few times is the veil lifted to give us a glimpse of mother and child. On the fortieth day he was taken to the temple, and given to God. Then it was that another reminder of the glory of this child was given to the mother. An old man, Simeon, took the infant in his arms, and spoke of him as God's salvation. As he gave the parents his parting blessing he lifted the veil, and showed them a glimmering of the future. "This child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against." Then to the mother he said solemnly, "Yea, a sword shall pierce through thine own soul also." This was a foretelling of the sorrow which should come to the heart of Mary, and which came again and again, until at last she saw her son on a cross. The shadow of the cross rested on Mary's soul all the years. Every time she rocked her baby to sleep, and laid him down softly, covering his face with kisses, there would come into her heart a pang as she remembered Simeon's words. Perhaps, too, words from the old prophets would come into her mind,—"He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows;" "He was bruised for our iniquities,"—and the tears would come welling into her eyes. Every time she saw her child at play, full of gladness, all unconscious of any sorrow awaiting him, a nameless fear would steal over her as she remembered the ominous words which had fallen upon her ear, and which she could not forget.
Soon after the presentation in the temple came the visit of the magi. Again the mother must have wondered as she heard these strangers from the East speak of her infant boy as the "King of the Jews," and saw them falling down before him in reverent worship, and then laying their offerings at his feet. Immediately following this came the flight into Egypt. How the mother must have pressed her child to her bosom as she fled with him to escape the cruel danger! By and by they returned, and from that time Nazareth was their home.
Only once in the thirty years do we have a glimpse of mother and child. It was when Jesus went to his first Passover. When the time came for returning home the child tarried behind. After a painful search the mother found him in one of the porches of the temple, sitting with the rabbis, an eager learner. There is a tone of reproach in her words, "Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing." She was sorely perplexed. All the years before this her son had implicitly obeyed her. He had never resisted her will, never withdrawn from her guidance. Now he had done something without asking her about it—as it were, had taken his life into his own hand. It was a critical point in the friendship of this mother and her child. It is a critical moment in the friendship of any mother and her child when the child begins to think and act for himself, to do things without the mother's guidance.
The answer of Jesus is instructive: "I must be about my Father's business." There was another besides his mother to whom he owed allegiance. He was the Son of God as well as the son of Mary. Parents should remember this always in dealing with their children,—their children are more God's than theirs.
It is interesting to notice what follows that remarkable experience of mother and child in the temple. Jesus returned with his mother to the lowly Nazareth home, and was subject to her. In recognizing his relation to God as his heavenly Father, he did not become any less the child of his earthly mother. He loved his mother no less because he loved God more. Obedience to the Father in heaven did not lead him to reject the rule of earthly parenthood. He went back to the quiet home, and for eighteen years longer found his Father's business in the common round of lowly tasks which made up the daily life of such a home.
It would be intensely interesting to read the story of mother and son during those years, but it has not been written for us. They must have been years of wondrous beauty. Few things in this world are more beautiful than such friendships as one sometimes sees between mother and son. The boy is more the lover than the child. The two enter into the closest companionship. A sacred and inviolable intimacy is formed between them. The boy opens all his heart to his mother, telling her everything; and she, happy woman, knows how to be a boy's mother and to keep a mother's place without ever startling or checking the shy confidences, or causing him to desire to hide anything from her. The boy whispers his inmost thoughts to his mother, and listens to her wise and gentle counsels with loving eagerness and childish faith—
"Her face his holy skies;
The air he breathes his mother's breath,
His stars his mother's eyes."
Not always are mother and boy such friends. Some mothers do not think it worth while to give the time and thought necessary to enter into a boy's life in such confidential way. But we may be sure that between the mother of Jesus and her son the most tender and intimate friendship existed. He opened his soul to her; and she gave him not a mother's love only, but also a mother's wise counsel and strong, inspiring sympathy.
It is almost certain that sorrow entered the Nazareth home soon after the visit to Jerusalem. Joseph is not mentioned again; and it is supposed that he died, leaving Mary a widow. On Jesus, as the eldest son, the care of the mother now rested. Knowing the deep love of his heart and his wondrous gentleness, it is easy for us to understand with what unselfish devotion he cared for his mother after she was widowed. He had learned the carpenter's trade; and day after day, early and late, he wrought with his hands to provide for her wants. Very sacred must have been the friendship of mother and son in those days. Her gentleness, quietness, hopefulness, humility, and prayerfulness, must have wrought themselves into the very tissue of his character as he moved through the days in such closeness. Unto the end he carried in his soul the benedictions of his mother's life.
The thirty silent years of preparation closed, and Jesus went out to begin his public ministry. The first glimpse we have of the mother is at the wedding at Cana. Jesus was there too. The wine failed, and Mary went to Jesus about the matter. "They have no wine," she said. Evidently she was expecting some manifesting of supernatural power. All the years since his birth she had been carrying in her heart a great wonder of expectation. Now he had been baptized, and had entered upon his work as the Messiah. Had not the time come for miracle-working?
The answer of Jesus startles us: "Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come." The words seem to have in them a tone of reproof, or of repulse, unlike the words of so gentle and loving a son. But really there is in his reply nothing inconsistent with all that we have learned to think of the gentleness and lovingness of the heart of Jesus. In substance he said only that he must wait for his Father's word before doing any miracle, and that the time for this had not yet come. Evidently his mother understood him. She was not hurt by his words, nor did she regard them as a refusal to help in the emergency. Her words to the servants show this: "Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it." She had learned her lesson of sweet humility. She knew now that God had the highest claim on her son's obedience, and she quietly waited for the divine voice. The holy friendship was not marred.
There is another long period in which no mention is made of Mary. Probably she lived a secluded life. But one day at Capernaum, in the midst of his popularity, when Jesus was preaching to a great crowd, she and his brothers appeared on the outside of the throng, and sent a request that they might speak with him. It seems almost certain that the mother's errand was to try to get him away from his exhausting work; he was imperilling his health and his safety. Jesus refused to be interrupted. But it was really only an assertion that nothing must come between him and his duty. The Father's business always comes first. Human ties are second to the bond which binds us to God. No dishonor was done by Jesus to his mother in refusing to be drawn away by her loving interest from his work. The holiest human friendship must never keep us from doing the will of God. Other mothers in their love for their children have made the same mistake that the mother of Jesus made,—have tried to withhold or withdraw their children from service which seemed too hard or too costly. The voice of tenderest love must be quenched when it would keep us from doing God's will.
The next mention of the mother of Jesus is in the story of the cross. Ah, holy mother-love, constant and faithful to the end! At length Simeon's prophecy is fulfilled,—a sword is piercing the mother's soul also. "Jesus was crucified on the cross; Mary was crucified at the foot of the cross."
Note only one feature of the scene,—the mother-love there is in it. The story of clinging mother-love is a wonderful one. A mother never forsakes her child. Mary is not the only mother who has followed a son to a cross. Here we have the culmination of this mother's friendship for her son. She is watching beside his cross. O friendship constant, faithful, undying, and true!
But what of the friendship of the dying son for his mother? In his own anguish does he notice her? Yes; one of the seven words spoken while he hung on the cross told of changeless love in his heart for her. Mary was a woman of more than fifty, "with years before her too many for remembering, too few for forgetting." The world would be desolate for her when her son was gone. So he made provision for her in the shelter of a love in which he knew she would be safe. As he saw her led away by the beloved disciple to his own home, part of the pain of dying was gone from his own heart. His mother would have tender care.
The story of this blessed friendship should sweeten forever in Christian homes the relation of mother and child. It should make every mother a better woman and a better mother. It should make every child a truer, holier child. Every home should have its sacred friendships between parents and children. Thus something of heaven will be brought down to our dull earth; for, as Mrs. Browning says,—
In the pure loves of child and mother
Two human loves make one divine.
CHAPTER III.
JESUS AND HIS FORERUNNER.
Where is the lore the Baptist taught,
The soul unswerving and the fearless tongue?
The much-enduring wisdom, sought
By lonely prayer the haunted rocks among?
Who counts it gain
His light should wane,
So the whole world to Jesus throng?
KEBLE.
The two Johns appear in many devotional pictures, one on each side of Jesus. Yet the two men were vastly unlike. The Baptist was a wild, rugged man of the desert; the apostle was the representative of the highest type of gentleness and spiritual refinement. The former was the consummate flower of Old Testament prophecy; the latter was the ripe fruit of New Testament evangelism. They appear in history one really on each side of Jesus; one going before him to prepare the way for him, and the other coming after him to declare the meaning of his mission. They were united in Jesus; both of them were his friends.
It seems probable that Jesus and the Baptist had never met until the day Jesus came to be baptized. This is not to be wondered at. Their childhood homes were not near to each other. Besides, John probably turned away at an early age from the abodes of men to make his home in the desert. He may never have visited Jesus, and it is not unlikely that Jesus had never visited him.
Yet their mothers are said to have been cousins. The stories of their births are woven together in an exquisite way, in the opening chapters of the Gospels. To the same high angel fell the privilege of announcing to the two women, in turn, the tidings which in each case meant so much of honor and blessedness. It would have seemed natural for the boys to grow up together, their lives blending in childhood association and affection. It is interesting to think what the effect would have been upon the characters of both if they had been reared in close companionship. How would John's stern, rugged, unsocial nature have affected the gentle spirit of Jesus? What impression would the brightness, sweetness, and affectionateness of Jesus have made on the temper and disposition of John?
When at last the two men met, it is evident that a remarkable effect was produced on John. There was something in the face of Jesus that almost overpowered the fearless preacher of the desert. John had been waiting and watching for the Coming One, whose herald and harbinger he was. One day he came and asked to be baptized. John had never before hesitated to administer the rite to any one who stood before him; for in every one he saw a sinner needing repentance and remission of sins. But he who now stood before him waiting to be baptized bore upon his face the light of an inner holiness which awed the rugged preacher. "I have need to be baptized of thee," said John; but Jesus insisted, and the rite was administered. John's awe must have been deepened by what now took place. Jesus looked up in earnest prayer, and then from the open heaven a white dove descended, resting on the head of the Holy One. An ancient legend tells that from the shining light the whole valley of the Jordan was illuminated. A divine voice was heard also, declaring that this Jesus was the Son of God.
Thus it was that the friendship between Jesus and the Baptist began. It was a wonderful moment. For centuries prophets had been pointing forward to the Messiah who was to come; now John saw him. He had baptized him, thus introducing him to his great mission. This made John the greatest of the prophets; he saw the Messiah whom his predecessors had only foretold. John's rugged nature must have been wondrously softened by this meeting with Jesus.
Brief was the duration of the friendship of the forerunner and the
Messiah; but there are evidences that it was strong, deep, and true.
There were several occasions on which this friendship proved its
sincerity and its loyalty.
Reports of the preaching of John, and of the throngs who were flocking to him, reached Jerusalem; and a deputation was sent by the Sanhedrin to the desert to ask him who he was. They had begun to think that this man who was attracting such attention might be the Messiah for whom they were looking. But John was careful to say that he was not the Christ. "Art thou Elias? … Art thou that prophet?" He answered "No."—"Who art thou, then?" they asked, "that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself?"
This gave John an opportunity to claim the highest honor for himself if he had been disposed to do so. He might have admitted that he was the Messiah, or quietly permitted the impression to be cherished; and in the state of feeling and expectation then prevailing among the people, there would have been a great uprising to carry him to a throne. But his loyalty to truth and to the Messiah whose forerunner he was, was so strong that he firmly resisted the opportunity, with whatever of temptation it may have had for him. "I am a voice," he answered—nothing but a voice. Thus he showed an element of greatness in his lowly estimate of himself.
True, a voice may do great things. It may speak words which shall ring through the world with a blessing in every reverberation. It may arouse men to action, may comfort sorrow, cheer discouragement, start hope in despairing hearts. If one is only a voice, and if there be truth and love and life in the voice, its ministry may be rich in its influence.
Much of the Bible is but a voice coming out of the depths of the past. No one knows the names of all the holy men who, moved by the Spirit, wrote the wonderful words. Many of the sweetest of the Psalms are anonymous. Yet no one prizes the words less, nor is their power to comfort, cheer, inspire, or quicken any less, because they are only voices. After all, it is a great thing to be a voice to which men and women will listen, and whose words do good wherever they go.
Yet John's speaking thus of himself shows his humility. He sought no earthly praise or recognition. He was not eager to have his name sounding on people's lips. He knew well how empty such honor was. He wished only that he might be a voice, speaking out the word he had been sent into the world to speak. He knew that he had a message to deliver, and he was intent on delivering it. It mattered not who or what he was, but it did matter whether his "word or two" were spoken faithfully or not.
Every one of us has a message from God to men. We are in this world for a purpose, with a mission, with something definite to do for God and man. It makes very little difference whether people hear about us or not, whether we are praised, loved, and honored, or despised, hated, and rejected, so that we get our word spoken into the air, and set going in men's hearts and lives. John was a worthy voice, and his tones rang out with clarion clearness for truth and for God's kingdom. It was his mission to go in advance of the King, and tell men that he was coming, calling them to prepare the way before him. This he did; and when the King came, John's work was done.
The deputation asked him also why he was baptizing if he was neither the Christ nor Elijah. Again John honored his friend by saying, "I baptize with water: but there standeth one among you, whom ye know not; he it is, who coming after me is preferred be fore me, whose shoe's latchet I am not worthy to unloose." John set the pattern for friendship for Christ for all time. It is,—
"None of self, and all of thee."
It is pitiable to see how some among the Master's followers fail to learn this lesson. They contend for high places, where they may have prominence among men, where their names shall have honor. The only truly great in Christ's sight are those who forget self that they may honor their Lord. John said he was not worthy to unloose the shoe-latchet of his friend, so great, so kingly, so worthy was that friend. He said his own work was only external, while the One standing unrecognized among the people had power to reach their hearts. It were well if every follower of Christ understood so perfectly the place of his own work with relation to Christ's.
Another of John's testimonies to Jesus was made a little later, perhaps as Jesus returned after his temptation. Pointing to a young man who was approaching, he said, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." It was a high honor which in these words John gave to his friend. That friend was the bearer of the world's sin and of its sorrow. It is not likely that at this early stage John knew of the cross on which Jesus should die for the world. In some way, however, he saw a vision of Jesus saving his people from their sin, and so proclaimed him to the circle that stood round him. He proclaimed him also as the Son of God, thus adding yet another honor to his friend.
A day or two later John again pointed Jesus out to two of his own disciples as the Lamb of God, and then bade them leave him and go after the Messiah. This is another mark of John's noble friendship for Jesus,—he gave up his own disciples that they might go after the new Master. It is not easy to do this. It takes a brave man to send his friends away, that they may give their love and service to another master.
There is further illustration of John's loyal friendship for Jesus. It seems that John's disciples were somewhat jealous of the growing fame and influence of Jesus. The throngs that followed their master were now turning after the new teacher. In their great love for John, and remembering how he had witnessed for Jesus, and called attention to him, before he began his ministry and after, they felt that it was scarcely right that Jesus should rise to prosperity at the expense of him who had so helped him rise. If John had been less noble than he was, and his friendship for Jesus less loyal, such words from his followers would have embittered him. There are people who do irreparable hurt by such flattering sympathy. A spark of envy is often fanned into a disastrous flame by friends who come with such appeals to the evil that is in every man.
But John's answer shows a soul of wondrous nobleness. He had not been hurt by popularity, as so many men are. Not all good people pass through times of great success, with its attendant elation and adulation, and come out simple-hearted and lowly. Then even a severer test of character is the time of waning favor, when the crowds melt away, and when another is receiving the applause. Many a man, in such an experience, fails to retain sweetness of spirit, and becomes soured and embittered.
John stood both tests. Popularity did not make him vain. The losing of his fame did not embitter him. He kept humble and sweet through it all. The secret was his unwavering loyalty to his own mission as the harbinger of the Messiah. "A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven," he said. The power over men which he had wielded for a time had been given to him. Now the power had been withdrawn, and given to Jesus. It was all right, and he should not complain of what Heaven had done.
Then John reminded his friends that he had distinctly said that he was not the Christ, but was only one sent before him. In a wondrously expressive way he explained his relation to Jesus. Jesus was the bridegroom, and John was only the bridegroom's friend, and he rejoiced in the bridegroom's honor. It was meet that the bridegroom should have the honor, and that his friend should retire into the background, and there be forgotten. Thus John showed his loyalty to Jesus by rejoicing in his popular favor, when the effect was to leave John himself deserted and alone after a season of great fame. "He must increase, but I must decrease," said the noble-hearted forerunner. John's work was done, and the work of Jesus was now beginning. John understood this, and with devoted loyalty, unsurpassed in all the bright story of friendship, he rejoiced in the success that Jesus was winning, though it was at his own cost.
This is a model of noble friendship for all time. Envy poisons much human friendship. It is not easy to work loyally for the honor and advancement of another when he is taking our place, and drawing our crowds after him. But in any circumstances envy is despicable and most undivine. Then even in our friendship for Christ we need to be ever most watchful lest we allow self to creep in. We must learn to care only for his honor and the advancement of his kingdom, and never to think of ourselves.
So much for the friendship of John for Jesus. On several occasions we find evidences of very warm friendship in Jesus for John. John's imprisonment was a most pathetic episode in his life. It came from his fidelity as a preacher of righteousness. In view of all the circumstances, we can scarcely wonder that in his dreary prison he began almost to doubt, certainly to question, whether Jesus were indeed the Messiah. But it must be noted that even in this painful experience John was loyal to Jesus. When the question arose in his mind, he sent directly to Jesus to have it answered. If only all in whose minds spiritual doubts or questions arise would do this, good, and not evil, would result in every case; for Christ always knows how to reassure perplexed faith.
It was after the visit of the messengers from John that Jesus spoke the strong words which showed his warm friendship for his forerunner. John had not forfeited his place in the Master's heart by his temporary doubting. Jesus knew that his disciples might think disparagingly of John because he had sent the messengers with the question; and as soon as they were gone he began to speak about John, and to speak about him in terms of highest praise. It is an evidence of true friendship that one speaks well of one's friend behind his back. Some professed friendship will not stand this test. But Jesus spoke not a word of censure concerning John after the failure of his faith. On the other hand, he eulogized him in a most remarkable way. He spoke of his stability and firmness; John was not a reed shaken with the wind, he was not a self-indulgent man, courting ease and loving luxury; he was a man ready for any self-denial and hardship. Jesus added to this eulogy of John's qualities as a man, the statement that no greater soul than his had ever been born in this world. This was high praise indeed. It illustrates the loyalty of Jesus to the friend who had so honored him and was suffering now because of faithfulness to truth and duty.
There is another incident which shows how much Jesus loved John. It was after the foul murder of the Baptist. The record is very brief. The friends of the dead prophet gathered in the prison, and, taking up the headless body of their master, they carried it away to a reverent, tearful burial. Then they went and told Jesus. The narrative says, "When Jesus heard of it, he departed thence by ship into a desert place apart." His sorrow at the tragic death of his faithful friend made him wish to be alone. When the Jews saw Jesus weeping beside the grave of Lazarus they said, "Behold how he loved him!" No mention is made of tears when Jesus heard of the death of John; but he immediately sought to break away from the crowds, to be alone, and there is little doubt that when he was alone he wept. He loved John, and grieved over his death.
The story of the friendship of Jesus and John is very beautiful.
John's loyalty and faithfulness must have brought real comfort to
Jesus. Then to John the friendship of Jesus must have been full of
cheer.
As we read the story of the Baptist's life, with its tragic ending, we are apt to feel that he died too soon. He began his public work with every promise of success. For a few months he preached with great power, and thousands flocked to hear him. Then came the waning of his popularity, and soon he was shut up in a prison, and in a little while was cruelly murdered to humor the whim of a wicked and vengeful woman.
Was it worth while to be born, and to go through years of severe training, only for such a fragment of living? To this question we can answer only that John had finished his work. He came into the world—a man sent from God—to do just one definite thing,—to prepare the way for the Messiah. When the Messiah had come, John's work was done. As the friend of Christ he went home; and elsewhere now, in other realms perhaps, he is still serving his Lord.
CHAPTER IV.
JESUS' CONDITIONS OF FRIENDSHIP.
But if himself he come to thee, and stand
* * *
And reach to thee himself the Holy Cup,
* * *
Pallid and royal, saying, "Drink with me,"
Wilt thou refuse? Nay, not for paradise!
The pale brow will compel thee, the pure hands
Will minister unto thee; thou shalt take
Of that communion through the solemn depths
Of the dark waters of thine agony,
With heart that praises him, that yearns to him
The closer through that hour.
Ugo Bassi's Sermon.
Every thoughtful reader of the Gospels notes two seemingly opposing characteristics of Christ's invitations,—their wideness and their narrowness. They were broad enough to include all men; yet by their conditions they were so narrowed down that only a few seemed able to accept them.
The gospel was for the world. It was as broad as the love of God, and that is absolutely without limit. God loved the world. When Jesus went forth among men his heart was open to all. He was the patron of no particular class. For him there were no outcasts whom he might not touch, with whom he might not speak in public, or privately, or who were excluded from the privileges of friendship with him. He spoke of himself as the Son of man—not the son of a man, but the Son of man, and therefore the brother of every man. Whoever bore the image of humanity had a place in his heart. Wherever he found a human need it had an instant claim on his sympathy, and he was eager to impart a blessing. No man had fallen so low in sin that Jesus passed him by without love and compassion. To be a man was the passport to his heart.
The invitations which Jesus gave all bear the stamp of this exceeding broadness. "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." "Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out." "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink." Such words as these were ever falling from his lips. No man or woman, hearing these invitations, could ever say, "There is nothing there for me." There was no hint of possible exclusion for any one. Not a word was ever said about any particular class of persons who might come,—the righteous, the respectable, the cultured, the unsoiled, the well-born, the well-to-do. Jesus had no such words in his vocabulary. Whoever labored and was heavy laden was invited. Whoever would come should be received—would not in any wise be cast out. Whoever was athirst was bidden to come and drink.
Some teachers are not so good as their teachings. They proclaim the love of God for every man, and then make distinctions in their treatment of men. Professing love for all, they gather their skirts close about them when fallen ones pass by. But Jesus lived out all of the love of God that he taught. It was literally true in his case, that not one who came to him was ever cast out. He disregarded the proprieties of righteousness which the religious teachers of his own people had formulated and fixed. They read in the synagogue services, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself," but they limited the word neighbor until it included only the circle of the socially and spiritually élite. Jesus taught that a man's neighbor is a fellow-man in need, whoever he may be. Then, when the lost and the outcast came to him they found the love of God indeed incarnate in him.
At one time we read that all the publicans and sinners drew near unto him to hear him. The religious teachers of the Jews found sore fault with him, saying, "This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them." But he vindicated his course by telling them that he had come for the very purpose of seeking the lost ones. On another occasion he said that he was a physician, and that the physician's mission was not to the whole, but to the sick. He had come not to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance. A poor woman who was a sinner, having heard his gracious invitation, "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden," came to his feet, at once putting his preaching to the test. She came weeping, and, falling at his feet, wet them with her tears, and then wiped them with her dishevelled hair and kissed them. Then she took an alabaster box, and breaking it, poured the ointment on his feet. It was a violation of all the proprieties to permit such a woman to stay at his feet, making such demonstrations. If he had been a Jewish rabbi, he would have thrust her away with execrations, as bringing pollution in her touch. But Jesus let the woman stay and finish her act of penitence and love, and then spoke words which assured her of forgiveness and peace.
"She sat and wept, and with her untressed hair
Still wiped the feet she was so blest to touch;
And he wiped off the soiling of despair
From her sweet soul, because she loved so much."
This is but one of the many proofs in Jesus' life of the sincerity of the wide invitations he gave. Continually the lost and fallen came to him, for there was something in him that made it easy for them to come and tell him all the burden of their sin and their yearning for a better life. Even one whom he afterward chose as an apostle was a publican when Jesus called him to be his disciple. He took him in among his friends, into his own inner household; and now his name is on one of the foundations of the heavenly city, as an apostle of the Lamb.
Thus we see how broad was the love of Christ, both in word and in act. Toward every human life his heart yearned. He had a blessing to bestow upon every soul. Whosoever would might be a friend of Jesus, and come in among those who stood closest to him. Not one was shut out.
Then, there is another class of words which appear to limit these wide invitations and this gracious love. Again and again Jesus seems to discourage discipleship. When men would come, he bids them consider and count the cost before they decide. One passage tells of three aspirants for discipleship, for all of whom he seems to have made it hard to follow him.
One man came to him, and with glib and easy profession said, "I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest." This seemed all that could have been asked. No man could do more. Yet Jesus discouraged this ardent scribe. He saw that he did not know what he was saying, that he had not counted the cost, and that his devotion would fail in the face of the hardship and self-denial which discipleship would involve. So he answered, "The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head." That is, he painted a picture of his own poverty and homelessness, as if to say, "That is what it will mean for you to follow me; are you ready for it?"
Then Jesus turned to another, and said to him, "Follow me." But this man asked time. "Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father." This seemed a reasonable request. Filial duties stand high in all inspired teaching. Yet Jesus said, "No; leave the dead to bury their own dead; but go thou and publish abroad the kingdom of God." Discipleship seems severe in its demands if even a sacred duty of love to a father must be foregone that the man might go instantly to his work as a missionary.
There was a third case. Another man, overhearing what had been said, proposed also to become a disciple—but not yet. "I will follow thee; but first suffer me to bid farewell to them that are at my house." That, too, appeared only a fit thing to do; but again the answer seems stern and severe. "No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God." Even the privilege of running home to say "Good-by" must be denied to him who follows Jesus.
These incidents show, not that Jesus would make it hard and costly for men to be his disciples, but that discipleship must be unconditional, whatever the cost, and that even the holiest duties of human love must be made secondary to the work of Christ's kingdom. Another marked instance of like teaching was in the case of the young ruler who wanted to know the way of life. We try to make it easy for inquirers to begin to follow Christ, but Jesus set a hard task for this rich young man. He must give up all his wealth, and come empty-handed with the new Master. Why did he so discourage this earnest seeker? He saw into his heart, and perceived that he could not be a true disciple unless he first won a victory over himself. The issue was his money or Jesus—which? The way was made so hard that for that day, at least, the young man turned away, clutching his money, leaving Jesus.
Really, a like test was made in every discipleship. Those who followed him left all, and went empty-handed with him. They were required to give up father and mother, and wife and children, and lands, and to take up their cross and follow him.
Why were the broad invitations of the heart of Jesus so narrowed in their practical application? The answer is very simple. Jesus was the revealing of God—God manifest in the flesh. He had come into this world not merely to heal a few sick people, to bring back joy to a few darkened homes by the restoring of their dead, to formulate a system of moral and ethical teachings, to start a wave of kindliness and a ministry of mercy and love; he had come to save a lost world, to lift men up out of sinfulness into holiness.
There was only one way to do this,—men must be brought back into loyalty to God. Jesus astonishes us by the tremendous claims and demands he makes. He says that men must come unto him if they would find rest; that they must believe on him if they would have everlasting life; that they must love him more than any human friend; that they must obey him with absolute, unquestioning obedience; that they must follow him as the supreme and only guide of their life, committing all their present and eternal interests into his hands. In a word, he puts himself deliberately into the place of God, demanding for himself all that God demands, and then promising to those who accept him all the blessings that God promises to his children.
This was the way Jesus sought to save men. As the human revealing of God, coming down close to humanity, and thus bringing God within their reach, he said, "Believe on me, love me, trust me, and follow me, and I will lift you up to eternal blessedness." While the invitation was universal, the blessings it offered could be given only to those who would truly receive Christ as the Son of God. If Jesus seemed to demand hard things of those who would follow him, it was because in no other way could men be saved. No slight and easy bond would bind them to him, and only by their attachment to him could they be led into the kingdom of God. If he sometimes seemed to discourage discipleship, it was that no one might be deceived as to the meaning of the new life to which Jesus was inviting men. He would have no followers who did not first count the cost, and know whether they were ready to go with him. Men could be lifted up into a heavenly life only by a friendship with Jesus which would prove stronger than all other ties.
Religion, therefore, is a passion for Christ. "I have only one passion," said Zinzendorf, "and that is he." Love for Christ is the power that during these nineteen centuries has been transforming the world. Law could never have done it, though enforced by the most awful majesty. The most perfect moral code, though proclaimed with supreme authority, would never have changed darkness to light, cruelty to humaneness, rudeness to gentleness. What is it that gives the gospel its resistless power? It is the Person at the heart of it. Men are not called to a religion, to a creed, to a code of ethics, to an ecclesiastical system,—they are called to love and follow a Person.
But what is it in Jesus that so draws men, that wins their allegiance away from every other master, that makes them ready to leave all for his sake, and to follow him through peril and sacrifice, even to death? Is it his wonderful teaching? "No man ever spake like this man." Is it his power as revealed in his miracles? Is it his sinlessness? The most malignant scrutiny could find no fault in him. Is it the perfect beauty of his character? Not one nor all of these will account for the wonderful attraction of Jesus. Love is the secret. He came into the world to reveal the love of God—he was the love of God in human flesh. His life was all love. In a most wonderful way during all his life did he reveal love. Men saw it in his face, and felt it in his touch, and heard it in his voice. This was the great fact which his disciples felt in his life. His friendship was unlike any friendship they had ever seen before, or even dreamed of. It was this that drew them to him, and made them love him so deeply, so tenderly. Nothing but love will kindle love. Power will not do it. Holiness will not do it. Gifts will not do it—men will take your gifts, and then repay you with hatred. But love begets love; heart responds to heart. Jesus loved.
But the love he revealed in his life, in his tender friendship, was not the supremest manifesting of his love. He crowned it all by giving his life. "I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep." This was the most wonderful exhibition of love the world had ever seen. Now and then some one had been willing to die for a choice and prized friend; but Jesus died for a world of enemies. It was not for the beloved disciple and for the brave Peter that he gave his life,—then we might have understood it,—but it was for the race of sinful men that he poured out his most precious blood,—the blood of eternal redemption. It is this marvellous love in Jesus which attracts men to him. His life, and especially his cross, declares to every one: "God loves you. The Son of God gave himself for you." Jesus himself explained the wonderful secret in his words: "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." It is on his cross that his marvellous power is most surpassingly revealed. The secret of the attraction of the cross is love. "He loved me, and he gave himself for me."
Thus we find hints of what Jesus is as a friend—what he was to his first disciples, what he is to-day. His is perfect friendship. The best and richest human friendships are only little fragments of the perfect ideal. Even these we prize as the dearest things on earth. They are more precious than rarest gems. We would lose all other things rather than give up our friends. They bring to us deep joys, sweet comforts, holy inspirations. Life without friendship would be empty and lonely. Love is indeed the greatest thing. Nothing else in all the world will fill and satisfy the heart. Even earth's friendships are priceless. Yet the best and truest of them are only fragments of the perfect friendship. They bring us only little cupfuls of blessing. Their gentleness is marred by human infirmity, and sometimes turns to harshness. Their helpfulness at best is impulsive and uncertain, and ofttimes is inopportune and ill-timed.
But the friendship of Jesus is perfect. Its touch is always gentle and full of healing. Its helpfulness is always wise. Its tenderness is like the warmth of a heavenly summer, brooding over the life which accepts it. All the love of God pours forth in the friendship of Jesus. To be his beloved is to be held in the clasp of the everlasting arms. "I and my Father are one," said Jesus; his friendship, therefore, is the friendship of the Father. Those who accept it in truth find their lives flooded with a wealth of blessing.
Creeds have their place in the Christian life; their articles are the great framework of truth about which the fabric rises and from which it receives its strength. Worship is important, if it is vitalized by faith and the Holy Spirit. Rites have their sacred value as the channels through which divine grace is communicated. But that which is vital in all spiritual life is the friendship of Jesus, coming to us in whatever form it may. To know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge is living religion. Creeds and services and rites and sacraments bring blessing to us only as they interpret to us this love, and draw us into closer personal relations with Christ.
"Behold him now where he comes!
Not the Christ of our subtile creeds,
But the light of our hearts, of our homes,
Of our hopes, our prayers, our needs,
The brother of want and blame,
The lover of women and men."
The friendship of Jesus takes our poor earthly lives, and lifts them up out of the dust into beauty and blessedness. It changes everything for us. It makes us children of God in a real and living sense. It brings us into fellowship with all that is holy and true. It kindles in us a friendship for Christ, turning all the tides of our life into new and holy channels. It thus transforms us into the likeness of our Friend, whose we are, and whom we serve.
Thus Jesus is saving the world by renewing men's lives. He is setting up the kingdom of heaven on the earth. His subjects are won, not by force of arms, not by a display of Sinaitic terrors, but by the force of love. Men are taught that God loves them; they see that love first in the life of Jesus, then on his cross, where he died as the Lamb of God, bearing the sin of the world. Under the mighty sway of that love they yield their hearts to heaven's King. Thus love's conquests are going on. The friendship of Jesus is changing earth's sin and evil into heaven's holiness and beauty.
CHAPTER V.
JESUS CHOOSING HIS FRIENDS.
He seeks not thine, but thee, such as thou art,
For lo, his banner over thee is love.
CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.
If you loved only what were worth your love,
Love were clear gain, and wholly well for you.
Make the low nature better by your throes!
Give earth yourself, go up for gain above.
BROWNING.
Nothing in life is more important than the choosing of friends. Many young people wreck all by wrong choices, taking into their life those who by their influence drag them down. Many a man's moral failure dates from the day he chose a wrong friend. Many a woman's life of sorrow or evil began with the letting into her heart of an unworthy friendship. On the other hand, many a career of happiness, of prosperity, of success, of upward climbing, may be traced to the choice of a pure, noble, rich-hearted, inspiring friend. Mrs. Browning asked Charles Kingsley, "What is the secret of your life? Tell me, that I may make mine beautiful too." He replied, "I had a friend." There are many who have reached eminence of character or splendor of life who could give the same answer. They had a friend who came into their life at the right time, sent from God, and inspired in them whatever is beautiful in their character, whatever is worthy and noble in their career.
We may not put our Lord's choice of his apostles on precisely the same plane as our selecting of friends, as those men were to be more than ordinary friends; he was to put his mantle upon them, and they were to be the founders of his Church. Nevertheless, we may take lessons from the story for ourselves.
Jesus chose his friends deliberately. His disciples had been gathering about him for months. It was at least a year after the beginning of his public ministry that he chose the Twelve. He had had ample time to get well acquainted with the company of his followers, to test them, to study their character, to learn their qualities of strength or weakness.
Many fatal mistakes in the choosing of friends come from unfit haste. We would better take time to know our possible friends, and be sure that we know them well, before making the solemn compact that seals the attachment.
Jesus made his choice of friends a subject of prayer. He spent a whole night in prayer with God, and then came in the morning to choose his apostles. If Jesus needed thus to pray before choosing his friends, how much more should we seek God's counsel before taking a new friendship into our life! We cannot know what it may mean to us, whither it may lead us, what sorrow, care, or pain it may bring to us, what touches of beauty or of marring it may put upon our soul, and we dare not admit it unless God gives it to us. In nothing do young people need more the guidance of divine wisdom than when they are settling the question of who shall be their friends. At the Last Supper Jesus said in his prayer, referring to his disciples, "Thine they were, and thou gavest them me." It makes a friendship very sacred to be able to say, "God gave it to me. God sent me this friend."
In choosing his friends, Jesus thought not chiefly of the comfort and help they would be to him, but far more of what he might be to them. He did crave friendship for himself. His heart needed it just as any true human heart does. He welcomed affection whenever any one brought the gift to him. He accepted the friendship of the poor, of the children, of those he helped. We cannot understand how much the Bethany home was to him, with its confidence, its warmth, its shelter, its tender affection. One of the most pathetic incidents in the whole Gospel story is the hunger of Jesus for sympathy in the garden, when he came again and again to his human friends, hoping to find them alert in watchful love, and found them asleep. It was a cry of deep disappointment which came from his lips, "Could ye not watch with me one hour?" Jesus craved the blessing of friendship for himself, and in choosing the Twelve expected comfort and strength from his fellowship with them.
But his deepest desire was that he might be a blessing to them. He came "not to be ministered unto, but to minister;" not to have friends, but to be a friend. He chose the Twelve that he might lift them up to honor and good; that he might purify, refine, and enrich their lives; that he might prepare them to be his witnesses, the conservators of his gospel, the interpreters to the world of his life and teachings. He sought nothing for himself, but every breath he drew was full of unselfish love.
We should learn from Jesus that the essential quality in the heart of friendship is not the desire to have friends, but the desire to be a friend; not to get good and help from others, but to impart blessing to others. Many of the sighings for friendship which we have are merely selfish longings,—a desire for happiness, for pleasure, for the gratification of the heart, which friends would bring. If the desire were to be a friend, to do others good, to serve and to give help, it would be a far more Christlike longing, and would transform the life and character.
We are surprised at the kind of men Jesus chose for his friends. We would suppose that he, the Son of God, coming from heaven, would have gathered about him as his close and intimate companions the most refined and cultivated men of his nation,—men of intelligence, of trained mind, of wide influence. Instead of going to Jerusalem, however, to choose his apostles from among rabbis, priests, scribes, and rulers, he selected them from among the plain people, largely from among fishermen of Galilee. One reason for this was that he must choose these inner friends from the company which had been drawn to him and were already his followers, in true sympathy with him; and there were none of the great, the learned, the cultured, among these. But another reason was, that he cared more for qualities of the heart than for rank, position, name, worldly influence, or human wisdom. He wanted near him only those who would be of the same mind with him, and whom he could train into loyal, sympathetic apostles.
Jesus took these untutored, undisciplined men into his own household, and at once began to prepare them for their great work. It is worthy of note, that instead of scattering his teachings broadcast among the people, so that who would might gather up his words, and diffusing his influence throughout a mass of disciples, while distinctly and definitely impressing none ineffaceably, Jesus chose twelve men, and concentrated his influence upon them. He took them into the closest relations to himself, taught them the great truths of his kingdom, impressed upon them the stamp of his own life, and breathed into them his own spirit. We think of the apostles as great men; they did become great. Their influence filled many lands—fills all the world to-day. They sit on thrones, judging all the tribes of men, But all that they became, they became through the friendship of Jesus. He gave them all their greatness. He trained them until their rudeness grew into refined culture. No doubt he gave much time to them in private. They were with him continually. They saw all his life.
It was a high privilege to live with Jesus those three years,—eating with him, walking with him, hearing all his conversations, witnessing his patience, his kindness, his thoughtfulness. It was almost like living in heaven; for Jesus was the Son of God—God manifest in the flesh. When Philip said to Jesus, "Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us," Jesus answered, "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." Living with Jesus was, therefore, living with God—his glory tempered by the gentle humanity in which it was veiled, but no less divine because of this. For three years the disciples lived with God. No wonder that their lives were transformed, and that the best that was in them was wooed out by the blessed summer weather of love in which they moved.
"He chose twelve." Probably this was because there were twelve tribes of Israel, and the number was to be continued. One evangelist says that he sent them out two and two. Why by two and two? With all the world to evangelize, would it not have been better if they had gone out one by one? Then they would have reached twice as many points. Was it not a waste of force, of power, to send two to the same place?
No doubt Jesus had reasons. It would have been lonely for one man to go by himself. If there were two, one would keep the other company. There was opposition to the gospel in those days, and it would have been hard for one to endure persecution alone. The handclasp of a brother would make the heart braver and stronger. We do not know how much we owe to our companionships, how they strengthen us, how often we would fail and sink down without them.
One of the finest definitions of happiness in literature is that given by Oliver Wendell Holmes. "Happiness," said the Autocrat, "is four feet on the fender." When his beloved wife was gone, and an old friend came in to condole with him, he said, shaking his gray head, "Only two feet on the fender now." Congenial companionship is wonderfully inspiring. Aloneness is pain. You cannot kindle a fire with one coal. A log will not burn alone. But put two coals or two logs side by side, and the fire kindles and blazes and burns hotly. Jesus yoked his apostles in twos that mutual friendship might inspire them both.
There was another reason for mating the Twelve. Each of them was only a fragment of a man—not one of them was full-rounded, a complete man, strong at every point. Each had a strength of his own, with a corresponding weakness. Then Jesus yoked them together so that each two made one good man. The hasty, impetuous, self-confident Peter needed the counterbalancing of the cautious, conservative Andrew. Thomas the doubter was matched by Matthew the strong believer. It was not an accidental grouping by which the Twelve fell into six parts. Jesus knew what was in man; and he yoked these men together in a way which brought out the best that was in each of them, and by thus blending their lives, turned their very faults and weaknesses into beauty and strength. He did not try to make them all alike. He made no effort to have Peter grow quiet and gentle like John, or Thomas become an enthusiastic, unquestioning believer like Matthew, He sought for each man's personality, and developed that. He knew that to try to recast Peter's tremendous energy into staidness and caution would only rob him of what was best in his nature. He found room in his apostle family for as many different types of temperament as there were men, setting the frailties of one over against the excessive virtues of the other.
It is interesting to note the method of Jesus in training his apostles. The aim of true friendship anywhere is not to make life easy for one's friend, but to make something of the friend. That is God's method. He does not hurry to take away every burden under which he sees us bending. He does not instantly answer our prayer for relief, when we begin to cry to him about the difficulty we have, or the trial we are facing, or the sacrifice we are making. He does not spare us hardship, loss, or pain. He wants not to make things easy for us, but to make something of us. We grow under burdens. It is poor, mistaken fathering or mothering that thinks only of saving a child from hard tasks or severe discipline. It is weak friendship that seeks only pleasure and indulgence for a loved one. "The chief want in life is somebody who shall make us do the best we can."
Jesus was the truest of friends. He never tried to make the burden light, the path smooth, the struggle easy. He wished to make men of his apostles,—men who could stand up and face the world; men whose character would reflect the beauty of holiness in its every line; men in whose hands his gospel would be safe when they went out as his ambassadors. He set for each apostle a high ideal, and then helped him to work up to the ideal. He taught them that the law of the cross is the law of life, that the saving of one's life is the losing of it, and that only when we lose our life, as men rate it, giving it out in love's service, do we really save it.
It is not easy to make a man. It is said that the violin-makers in distant lands, by breaking and mending with skilful hands, at last produce instruments having a more wonderful capacity than ever was possible to them when new, unbroken and whole. Whether this be true or not of violins, it certainly is true of human lives. We cannot merely grow into strength, beauty, nobleness, and power of helpfulness, without discipline, pain, and cost. It is written even of Jesus himself that he was made perfect through suffering. There was no sin in him; but his perfectness as a sympathizing Friend, as a helpful Saviour, came through struggle, trial, pain, and sorrow. Not one of the apostles reached his royal strength as a man, as a helper of men, as a representative of Jesus, without enduring loss and suffering. No man who ever rises to a place of real worth and usefulness in the world walks on a rose-strewn path. We never can be made fit for anything beautiful and worthy without cost of pain and tears. Always it is true that—
"Things that hurt and things that mar
Shape the man for perfect praise;
Shock and strain and ruin are
Friendlier than the smiling days."
How about ourselves? Life is made very real to our thought when we remember that in all the experiences of joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, success and failure, health and sickness, quiet or struggle, God is making men of us. Then he watches us to see if we fail. Here is a man who is passing through sore trial. For many months his wife has been a great sufferer. All the while he has been carrying a heavy burden,—a financial burden, a burden of sympathy; for every moment's pain that his wife has suffered has been like a sword in his own heart,—burdens of care, with broken nights and weary days. We may be sure of God's tender interest in the wife who suffers in the sick-room; but his eye is even more intently fixed upon him who is bearing the burden of sympathy and care. He is watching to see if the man will stand the test, and grow sweeter and stronger. Everything hard or painful in a Christian's life is another opportunity for him to get a new victory, and become a little more a man.
It is remarkable how little we know about the apostles. A few of them are fairly prominent. Peter and James and John we know quite well, as their names are made familiar in the inspired story. Matthew we know by the Gospel he wrote. Thomas we remember by his doubts. Another Judas, not Iscariot, probably left us a little letter. Of the rest we know almost nothing but their names. Indeed, few Bible readers can give even the names of all the Twelve.
No doubt one reason why no more is told us about the apostles is that the Bible magnifies only one name. It is not a book of biographies, but the book of the Lord Jesus Christ. Each apostle had a sacred friendship all his own with his Master, a friendship with which no other could intermeddle. We can imagine the quiet talks, the long walks with the deep communings, the openings of heart, the confessions of weakness and failure, the many prayers together. We may be very sure that through those three wonderful years there ran twelve stories of holy friendship, with their blessed revealings of the Master's heart to the heart of each man. But not a word of all this is written in the New Testament. It was too sacred to be recorded for any eye of earth to read.
We may be sure, too, that each man of the Twelve did a noble work after the Ascension, but no pen wrote the narratives for preservation. There are traditions, but there is in them little that is certainly history. The Acts is not the acts of the apostles. The book tells a little about John, a little more about Peter, most about Paul, and of the others gives nothing but a list of their names in the first chapter.
Yet we need not trouble ourselves about this. It is the same with the good and the useful in every age. A few names are preserved, but the great multitude are forgotten. Earth keeps scant record of its benefactors. But there is a place where every smallest kindness done in the name of Christ is recorded and remembered.
Long, long ages ago a beautiful fern grew in a deep vale, nodding in the breeze. One day it fell, complaining as it sank away that no one would remember its grace and beauty. The other day a geologist went out with his hammer in the interest of his science. He struck a rock; and there in the seam lay the form of a fern—every leaf, every fibre, the most delicate traceries of the leaves. It was the fern which ages since grew and dropped into the indistinguishable mass of vegetation. It perished; but its memorial was preserved, and to-day is made manifest.
So it is with the stories of the obscure apostles, and of all beautiful lives which have wrought for God and for man and have vanished from earth. Nothing is lost, nothing is forgotten. The memorials are in other lives, and some day every touch and trace and influence and impression will be revealed. In the book of The Revelation we are told that in the foundations of the heavenly city are the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. The New Testament does not tell the story of their worthy lives, but it is cut deep in the eternal rock, where all eyes shall see it forever.
On the lives of these chosen friends Jesus impressed his own image. His blessed divine-human friendship transformed them into men who went to the ends of the world for him, carrying his name. It was a new and strange influence on the earth—this holy friendship of Jesus Christ started in the hearts and lives of the apostles. At once it began to make this old world new. Those who believed received the same wonderful friendship into their own hearts. They loved each other in a way men had never loved before. Christians lived together as one family.
Ever since the day of Pentecost this wonderful friendship of Jesus has been spreading wherever the gospel has gone. It has given to the world its Christian homes with their tender affections; it has built hospitals and asylums, and established charitable institutions of all kinds in every place where its story has been told. From the cross of Jesus a wave of tenderness, like the warmth of summer, has rolled over all lands. The friendship of Jesus, left in the hearts of his apostles, as his legacy to the world, has wrought marvellously; and its ministry and influence will extend until everything unlovely shall cease from earth, and the love of God shall pervade all life.
CHAPTER VI.
JESUS AND THE BELOVED DISCIPLE.
My Lord, my Love! in pleasant pain
How often have I said,
"Blessed that John who on thy breast
Laid down his head."
It was that contact all divine
Transformed him from above,
And made him amongst men the man
To show forth holy love.
CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.
Love is regenerating the world. It is the love of God that is working this mighty transformation. The world was cold and loveless before Christ came. Of course there always was love in the race,—father-love, mother-love, filial love, love for country. There have always been human friendships which were constant, tender, and true, whose stories shine in bright lustre among the records of life. Natural affection there has always been, but Christian love was not in the world till Christ came.
The incarnation was the breaking into this world of the love of God. For three and thirty years Jesus walked among men, pouring out love in every word, in every act, in all his works, and in every influence of his life. Then on the cross his heart broke, spilling its love upon the earth. As Mary's ointment filled all the house where it was emptied out, so the love of God poured out in Christ's life and death is filling all the world.
Jesus put his love into human hearts that it might be carried everywhere. Instantly there was a wondrous change. The story of the Church after the day of Pentecost shows a spirit among the disciples of Christ which the world had never seen before. They had all things common. The strong helped the weak. They formed a fellowship which was almost heavenly. From that time to the present the leaven of love has been working. It has slowly wrought itself into every department of life,—into art, literature, music, laws, education, morals. Every hospital, orphanage, asylum, and reformatory in the world has been inspired by the love of Christ. Christian civilization is a product of this same divine affection working through the nations.
Perhaps no other of the Master's disciples has done so much in the interpreting and the diffusing of the love of Christ in the world as the beloved disciple has done. Peter was the mightiest force at the beginning in the founding of the Church. Then came Paul with his tremendous missionary energy, carrying Christianity to the ends of the earth. Each of these apostles was greatest in his own way and place. But John has done more than either of these to bless the world with love. His influence is everywhere. He is likest Jesus of all the disciples. His influence is slowly spreading among men. We see it in the enlarging spirit of love among Christians, in the increase of philanthropy, in the growing sentiment that war must cease among Christian nations, all disputes to be settled by arbitration, and in the feeling of universal brotherhood which is softening all true men's hearts toward each other.
It cannot but be intensely interesting to trace the story of the friendship of Jesus and John, for it was in this hallowed friendship that John learned all that he gave the world in his life and words. We are able to fix its beginning—when Jesus and John met for the first time. One day John the Baptist was standing by the Jordan with two of his disciples. One of these was Andrew; and the other we know was John—we know it because in John's own Gospel, where the incident is recorded, no name is given. The two young men had not yet seen Jesus; but the Baptist knew him, and pointed him out as he passed by, saying, "Behold the Lamb of God!"
The two young men went after Jesus, no doubt eager to speak with him. Hearing their footsteps behind him, he turned, and asked them what they sought. They asked, "Rabbi, where abidest thou?" He said, "Come, and ye shall see." They gladly accepted the invitation, went with him to his lodgings, and remained until the close of the day. We have no account of what took place during those happy hours. It would be interesting to know what Jesus said to his visitors, but not a word of the conversation has been preserved. We may be sure, however, that the visit made a deep impression on John.
Most days in our lives are unmarked by any special event. There are thousands of them that seem just alike, with their common routine. Once or twice, however, in the lifetime of almost every person, there is a day which is made forever memorable by some event or occurrence,—the first meeting with one who fills a large place in one's after years, a compact of sacred friendship, a revealing of some new truth, a decision which brought rich blessing, or some other experience which set the day forever apart among all days.
John lived to be a very old man; but to his latest years he must have remembered the day when he first met Jesus, and began with him the friendship which brought him such blessing. We may be sure that as at their first meeting the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul, so at this first meeting the soul of John was knit with the soul of Jesus in a holy friendship which brought unspeakable good to his life. There was that in Jesus which at once touched all that was best in John, and called out the sweetest music of his soul.
"Thou shall know him when he comes
Not by any din of drums,
Nor the vantage of his airs;
Neither by his crown,
Nor by his gown,
Nor by anything he wears.
He shall only well-known be
By the holy harmony
That his coming makes in thee!"
John calls himself the "disciple whom Jesus loved." This designation gives him a distinction even among the Master's personal friends. Jesus loved all the apostles, but there were three who belonged in an inner circle. Then, of these three, John was the best beloved. We are not told what it was in John that gave him this highest honor. He was probably a cousin of Jesus, as it is thought by many that their mothers were sisters. This blood relationship, however, would not account for the strong love that bound them together. There must have been certain qualities in John which fitted him in a peculiar way for being the closest friend of Jesus.
We know that John's personality was very winning. He was only a fisherman, and in his youth lacked opportunities for acquiring knowledge or refinement. If Mary and Salome were sisters, the blood of David's line was in John as well as in Jesus. It is something to have back of one's birth a long and noble descent. Besides, John was one of those rare men "who appear to be formed of finer clay than their neighbors, and cast in a gentler mould." Evidently he was by nature a man of sympathetic spirit, one born to be a friend.
The study of John's writings helps us to answer our question. Not once in all his Gospel does he refer to himself by name; yet as one reads the wonderful chapters, one is aware of a spirit, an atmosphere, of sweetness. There are fields and meadows in which the air is laden with fragrance, and yet no flowers can be seen. But looking closely, one finds, low on the ground, hidden by the tall grasses, a multitude of little lowly flowers. It is from these that the perfume comes. In every community there are humble, quiet lives, almost unheard of among men, who shed a subtle influence on all about them. Thus it is in the chapters of John's Gospel. The name of the writer nowhere appears, but the charm of his spirit pervades the whole book.
In the designation which he adopts for himself, there is a fine revealing of character. There is a beautiful self-obliteration in the hiding away of the author's personality that only the name and glory of Jesus may be seen. There are some good men, who, even when trying to exalt and honor their Lord, cannot resist the temptation to write their own name large, that those who see the Master may also see the Master's friend. In John there is an utter absence of this spirit. As the Baptist, when asked who he was, refused to give his name, and said he was only a voice proclaiming the coming of the King, so John spoke of himself only as one whom the Master loved.
We must note, too, that he does not speak of himself as the disciple who loved Jesus,—this would have been to boast of himself as loving the Master more than the other disciples did,—but as the disciple whom Jesus loved. In this distinction lies one of the subtlest secrets of Christian peace. Our hope does not rest in our love for Jesus, but in his love for us. Our love at the best is variable in its moods. To-day it glows with warmth and joy, and we say we could die for Christ; to-morrow, in some depression, we question whether we really love him at all, our feeling responds so feebly to his name. A peace that depends on our loving Christ is as variable as our own consciousness. But when it is Christ's love for us that is our dependence, our peace is undisturbed by any earthly changes.
Thus we find in John a reposeful spirit. He was content to be lowly. He knew how to trust. His spirit was gentle. He was of a deeply spiritual nature. Yet we must not think of him as weak or effeminate. Perhaps painters have helped to give this impression of him; but it is one that is not only untrue, but dishonoring. John was a man of noble strength. In his soul, under his quietness and sweetness of spirit, dwelt a mighty energy. But he was a man of love, and had learned the lesson of divine peace; thus he was a self-controlled man.
These are hints of the character of the disciple whom Jesus loved, whom he chose to be his closest friend. He was only a lad when Jesus first met him, and we must remember that the John we chiefly know was the man as he developed under the influence of Jesus. What Jesus saw in the youth who sat down beside him in his lodging-place that day, drank in his words, and opened his soul to him as a rose to the morning sun, was a nature rich in its possibilities of noble and beautiful character. The John we know is the man as he ripened in the summer of Christ's love. He is a product of pure Christ-culture. His young soul responded to every inspiration in his Master, and developed into rarer loveliness every day. Doubtless one of the qualities in John that fitted him to be the closest friend of Jesus was his openness of heart, which made him such an apt learner, so ready to respond to every touch of Christ's hand.
It would be interesting to trace the story of this holy friendship through the three years Jesus and John were together, but only a little of the wonderful narrative is written. Some months after the first meeting, there was another beside the sea. For some reason John and his companions had taken up their fishing again. Jesus came by in the early morning, and found the men greatly discouraged because they had been out all night and had caught nothing. He told them to push out, and to cast their net again, telling them where to cast it. The result was a great draught of fishes. It was a revealing of divine power which mightily impressed the fishermen. He then bade them to follow him, and said he would make them become fishers of men. Immediately they left the ship, and went with Jesus.
Thus John had now committed himself altogether to his new Master. From this time he remained with Jesus, following him wherever he went. He was in his school, and was an apt scholar. A little later there came another call. Jesus chose twelve men to be apostles, and among them was the beloved disciple. This choice and call brought him into yet closer fellowship with Jesus. Now the transformation of character would go on more rapidly because of the constancy and the closeness of John's association with his Master.
A peculiar designation is given to the brothers James and John. Jesus surnamed them Boanerges, the sons of thunder. There must have been a meaning in such a name given by Jesus himself. Perhaps the figure of thunder suggests capacity for energy—that the soul of John was charged, as it were, with fiery zeal. It appears to us, as we read John's writings, that this could not have been true. He seems such a man of love that we cannot think of him as ever being possessed of an opposite feeling. But there is evidence that by nature he was full of just such energy held in reserve. We see John chiefly in his writings; and these were the fruit of his mellow old age, when love's lessons had been well learned. It seems likely that in his youth he had in his breast a naturally quick, fiery temper. But under the culture of Jesus this spirit was brought into complete mastery. We have one illustration of this earlier natural feeling in a familiar incident. The people of a certain village refused to receive the Master, and John and his brother wished to call down fire from heaven to consume them. But Jesus reminded them that he was not in the world to destroy men's lives, but to save them.
We know not how often this lesson had to be taught to John before he became the apostle of love. It was well on in St. Paul's old age that he said he had learned in whatsoever state he was therein to be content. It is a comfort to us to know that he was not always able to say this, and that the lesson had to be learned by him just as it has to be learned by us. It is a comfort to us also to be permitted to believe that John had to learn to be the loving, gentle disciple he became in later life, and that the lesson was not an easy one.
It is instructive also to remember that it was through his friendship with Jesus that John received his sweetness and lovingness of character. An old Persian apologue tells that one found a piece of fragrant clay in his garden, and that when asked how it got its perfume the clay replied, "One laid me on a rose." John lived near the heart of Jesus, and the love of that heart of gentleness entered his soul and transformed him. There is no other secret for any who would learn love's great lesson. Abiding in Christ, Christ abides also in us, and we are made like him because he lives in us.
John's distinction of being one of the Master's closest friends brought him several times into experiences of peculiar sacredness. He witnessed the transfiguration, when for an hour the real glory of the Christ shone out through his investiture of flesh. This was a vision John never forgot. It must have impressed itself deeply upon his soul. He was also one of those who were led into the inner shadows of Gethsemane, to be near Jesus while he suffered, and to comfort him with love.
This last experience especially suggests to us something of what the friendship of John was to Jesus. There is no doubt that this friendship brought to John immeasurable comfort and blessing, enriching his life, and transforming his character. But what was the friendship to Jesus? There is no doubt that it was a great deal to him. He craved affection and sympathy, as every noble heart does just in the measure of its humanness. One of the saddest elements of the Gethsemane sorrow was the disappointment of Jesus, when, hungry for love, he went back to his chosen three, expecting to find a little comfort and strength, and found them sleeping.
The picture of John at the Last Supper, leaning on Jesus' breast, shows him to us in the posture in which we think of him most. It is the place of confidence; the bosom is only for those who have a right to closest intimacy. It is the place of love, near the heart. It is the place of safety, for he is in the clasp of the everlasting arms, and none can snatch him out of the impregnable shelter. It was the darkest night the world ever saw that John lay on the bosom of Jesus. That is the place of comfort for all sorrowing believers, and there is abundance of room for them all on that breast. John leaned on Jesus' breast,—weakness reposed on strength, helplessness on almighty help. We should learn to lean, to lean our whole weight, on Christ. That is the privilege of Christian faith.
There was one occasion when John seems to have broken away from his usual humility. He joined with his brother in a request for the highest places in the new kingdom. This is only one of the evidences of John's humanness,—that he was of like passions with the rest of us. Jesus treated the brothers with gentle pity—"Ye know not what ye ask." Then he explained to them that the highest places must be reached through toil and sorrow, through the paths of service and suffering. Later in life John knew what the Master's words meant. He found his place nearest to Christ, but it was not on the steps of an earthly throne; it was a nearness of love, and the steps to it were humility, self-forgetfulness, and ministry.
It must have given immeasurable comfort to Jesus to have John stay so near to him during the last scenes. If he fled for a moment in the garden when all the apostles fled, he soon returned; for he was close to his Master during his trial. Then, when he was on the cross, Jesus saw a group of loving friends near by, watching with breaking hearts; and among these was John. It lifted a heavy burden off the heart of Jesus to be able then to commit his mother to John, and to see him lead her away to his own home. It was a supreme expression of friendship,—choosing John from among all his friends for the sacred duty of sheltering this blessedest of women.
The story of this beautiful friendship of Jesus and John shows us what is possible in its own measure to every Christian discipleship. It is not possible for every Christian to be a St. John, but close friendship with Jesus is the privilege of every true believer; and all who enter into such a friendship will be transformed into the likeness of their Friend.
CHAPTER VII.
JESUS AND PETER.
"As the mighty poets take
Grief and pain to build their song,
Even so for every soul,
Whatsoe'er its lot may be,—
Building, as the heavens roll,
Something large and strong and free,—
Things that hurt and things that mar
Shape the man for perfect praise,
Shock and strain and ruin are
Friendlier than the smiling days."
Our first glimpse of Simon in the New Testament is as he was being introduced to Jesus. It was beside the Jordan. His brother had brought him; and that moment a friendship began which not only was of infinite and eternal importance to Simon himself, but which has left incalculable blessing in the world.
Jesus looked at him intently, with deep, penetrating gaze. He saw into his very soul. He read his character; not only what he was then, but the possibilities of his life,—what he would become under the power of grace. He then gave him a new name. "When Jesus beheld him, he said. Thou art Simon: … thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, a stone."
In a gallery in Europe there hang, side by side, Rembrandt's first picture, a simple sketch, imperfect and faulty, and his great masterpiece, which all men admire. So in the two names, Simon and Peter, we have, first the rude fisherman who came to Jesus that day, the man as he was before Jesus began his work on him; and second, the man as he became during the years when the friendship of Jesus had warmed his heart and enriched his life; when the teaching of Jesus had given him wisdom and kindled holy aspirations in his soul; and when the experiences of struggle and failure, of penitence and forgiveness, of sorrow and joy, had wrought their transformations in him.
"Thou art Simon." That was his name then. "Thou shalt be called Cephas." That was what he should become. It was common in the East to give a new name to denote a change of character, or to indicate a man's position among men. Abram's name was changed to Abraham—"Father of a multitude"—when the promise was sealed to him. Jacob's name, which meant supplanter, one who lived by deceit, was changed to Israel, a prince with God, after that night when the old nature was maimed and defeated while he wrestled with God, and overcame by clinging in faith and trust. So Simon received a new name when he came to Jesus, and began his friendship with him. "Thou shalt be called Cephas."
This did not mean that Simon's character was changed instantly into the quality which the new name indicated. It meant that Jesus saw in him the possibilities of firmness, strength, and stability, of which a stone is the emblem. It meant that this should be his character by and by, when the work of grace in him was finished. The new name was a prophecy of the man that was to be, the man that Jesus would make of him. Now he was only Simon—rash, impulsive, self-confident, vain, and therefore weak and unstable.
Some of the processes in this making of a man, this transformation of Simon into Cephas, we may note as we read the story. There were three years between the beginning of the friendship of Jesus and Simon and the time when the man was ready for his work. The process was not easy. Simon had many hard lessons to learn. Self-confidence had to be changed into humility. Impetuosity had to be chastened and disciplined into quiet self-control. Presumption had to be awed and softened into reverence. Thoughtfulness had to grow out of heedlessness. Rashness had to be subdued into prudence, and weakness had to be tempered into calm strength. All this moral history was folded up in the words, "Thou shalt be called Cephas—a stone."
The meeting by the Jordan was the beginning. A new friendship coming into a life may color all its future, may change its destiny. We never know what may come of any chance meeting. But the beginning of a friendship with Jesus has infinite possibilities of good. The giving of the new name must have put a new thought of life's meaning into Simon's heart. It must have set a new vision in his soul, and kindled new aspirations within his breast. Life must have meant more to him from that hour. He had glimpses of possibilities he had never dreamed of before. It is always so when Jesus truly comes into any one's life. A new conception of character dawns on the soul, a new ideal, a revelation which changes all thoughts of living. The friendship of Jesus is most inspiring.
Some months passed, and then came a formal call which drew Simon into close and permanent relations with Jesus. It was on the Sea of Galilee. The men were fishing. There had been a night of unsuccessful toil. In the morning Jesus used Simon's boat for a pulpit, speaking from its deck to the throngs on the shore. He then bade the men push out into deep water and let down their net. Simon said it was not worth while—still he would do the Master's bidding. The result was an immense haul of fishes.
The effect of the miracle on Simon's mind was overwhelming. Instantly he felt that he was in the presence of divine revealing, and a sense of his own sinfulness and unworthiness oppressed him. "Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord," he cried. Jesus quieted his terror with his comforting "Fear not." Then he said to him, "From henceforth thou shalt catch men." This was another self-revealing. Simon's work as a fisherman was ended. He forsook all, and followed Jesus, becoming a disciple in the full sense. His friendship with Jesus was deepening. He gave up everything he had, going with Jesus into poverty, homelessness, and—he knew not what.
Living in the personal household of Jesus, Simon saw his Master's life in all its manifold phases, hearing the words he spoke whether in public on in private conversation, and witnessing every revealing of his character, disposition, and spirit. It is impossible to estimate the influence of all this on the life of Simon. He was continually seeing new things in Jesus, hearing new words from his lips, learning new lessons from his life. One cannot live in daily companionship with any good man without being deeply influenced by the association. To live with Jesus in intimate relations of friendship was a holy privilege, and its effect on Simon's character cannot be estimated.
An event which must have had a great influence on Simon was his call to be an apostle. Not only was he one of the Twelve, but his name came first—it is always given first. He was the most honored of all, was to be their leader, occupying the first place among them. A true-hearted man is not elated or puffed up by such honoring as this. It humbles him, rather, because the distinction brings with it a sense of responsibility. It awes a good man to become conscious that God is intrusting him with place and duty in the world, and is using him to be a blessing to others. He must walk worthy of his high calling. A new sanctity invests him—the Lord has set him apart for holy service.
Another event which had a marked influence on Simon was his recognition of the Messiahship of Jesus. Just how this great truth dawned upon his consciousness we do not know, but there came a time when the conviction was so strong in him that he could not but give expression to it. It was in the neighborhood of Caesarea Philippi. Jesus had led the Twelve apart into a secluded place for prayer. There he asked them two solemn questions. He asked them first what the people were saying about him—who they thought he was. The answer showed that he was not understood by them; there were different opinions about him, none of them correct. Then he asked the Twelve who they thought he was. Simon answered, "The Christ, the Son of the living God." The confession was wonderfully comprehensive. It declared that Jesus was the Messiah, and that he was a divine being—the Son of the living God.
It was a great moment in Simon's life when he uttered this wonderful confession. Jesus replied with a beatitude for Simon, and then spoke another prophetic word: "Thou art Peter," using now the new name which was beginning to be fitting, as the new man that was to be was growing out of the old man that was being left behind. "Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church." It was a further unveiling of Simon's future. It was in effect an unfolding or expansion of what he had said when Simon first stood before him. "Thou shalt be called Cephas." As a confessor of Christ, representing all the apostles, Peter was thus honored by his Lord.
But the Messianic lesson was yet only partly learned. Simon believed that Jesus was the Messiah, but his conception of the Messiah was still only an earthly one. So we read that from that time Jesus began to teach the apostles the truth about his mission,—that he must suffer many things, and be killed. Then it was that Simon made his grave mistake in seeking to hold his Master back from the cross. "Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall never be unto thee," he said with great vehemence. Quickly came the stern reply, "Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art a stumbling-block unto me." Simon had to learn a new lesson. He did not get it fully learned until after Jesus had risen again, and the Holy Spirit had come,—that the measure of rank in spiritual life is the measure of self-forgetting service.
We get a serious lesson here in love and friendship. It is possible for us to become Satan even to those we love the best. We do this when we try to dissuade them from hard toil, costly service, or perilous missions to which God is calling them. We need to exercise the most diligent care, and to keep firm restraint upon our own affections, lest in our desire to make the way easier for our friends we tempt them to turn from the path which God has chosen for their feet.
Thus lesson after lesson did Simon have to learn, each one leading to a deeper humility. "Less of self and more of thee—none of self and all of thee." Thus we reach the last night with its sad fall. The denial of Peter was a terrible disappointment. We would have said it was impossible, as Peter himself said. He was brave as a lion. He loved Jesus deeply and truly. He had received the name of the rock. For three years he had been under the teaching of Jesus, and he had been received into special honor and favor among the apostles. He had been faithfully forewarned of his danger, and we say, "Forewarned is forearmed." Yet in spite of all, this bravest, most favored disciple, this man of rock, fell most ignominiously, at a time, too, when friendship to his Master ought to have made him truest and most loyal.
It was the loving gentleness of Jesus that saved him. What intense pain there must have been in the heart of the Master when, after hearing Peter's denial, he turned and looked at Peter!
"I think the look of Christ might seem to say,—
'Thou Peter! art thou then a common stone
Which I at last must break my heart upon,
For all God's charge to his high angels may
Guard my foot better? Did I yesterday
Wash thy feet, my beloved, that they should run
Quick to deny me 'neath the morning sun?
And do thy kisses like the rest betray?
The cock crows coldly. Go and manifest
A late contrition, but no bootless fear!
For when thy final need is dreariest,
Thou shalt not be denied, as I am here.
My voice, to God and angels, shall attest,
"Because I know this man, let him be clear."'"
It was after this look of wondrous love that Peter went out and wept bitterly. At last he remembered. It seemed too late, but it was not too late. The heart of Jesus was not closed against him, and he rose from his fall a new man.
What place had the denial in the story of the training of Peter? It had a very important place. Up to that last night, there was still a grave blemish in Simon's character. His self-confidence was an element of weakness. Perhaps there was no other way in which this fault could be cured but by allowing him to fall. We know at least that, in the bitter experience of denial, with its solemn repenting, Peter lost his weakness. He came from his penitence a new man. At last he was disinthralled. He had learned the lesson of humility. It was never again possible for him to deny his Lord. A little later, after a heart-searching question thrice repeated, he was restored and recommissioned—"Feed my lambs; feed my sheep."
So the work was completed; the vision of the new man had been realized. Simon had become Cephas. It had been a long and costly process, but neither too long nor too costly. While the marble was wasting, the image was growing.
You say it was a great price that Simon had to pay to be fashioned into Peter. You ask whether it was worth while, whether it would not have been quite as well for him if he had remained the plain, obscure fisherman he was when Jesus first found him. Then he would have been only a fisherman, and after living among his neighbors for his allotted years, he would have had a quiet funeral one day, and would have been laid to rest beside the sea. As it was, he had a life of poverty and toil and hard service. It took a great deal of severe discipline to make out of him the strong, firm man of rock that Jesus set out to produce in him. But who will say to-day that it was not worth while? The splendid Christian manhood of Peter has been now for nineteen centuries before the eyes of the world as a type of character which Christian men should emulate—a vision of life whose influence has touched millions with its inspiration. The price which had to be paid to attain this nobleness of character and this vastness of holy influence was not too great.
But how about ourselves? It may be quite as hard for some of us to be made into the image of beauty and strength which the Master has set for us. It may require that we shall pass through experiences of loss, trial, temptation, and sorrow. Life's great lessons are very long, and cannot be learned in a day, nor can they be learned easily. But life, at whatever cost, is worth while. It is worth while for the gold to pass through the fire to be made pure and clean. It is worth while for the gem to endure the hard processes necessary to prepare it for shining in its dazzling splendor. It is worth while for a life to submit to whatever of severe discipline may be required to bring out in it the likeness of the Master, and to fit it for noble doing and serving. Poets are said to learn in suffering what they teach in song. If only one line of noble, inspiring, uplifting song is sung into the world's air, and started on a world-wide mission of blessing, no price paid for the privilege is too much to pay. David had to suffer a great deal to be able to write the Twenty-Third Psalm, but he does not now think that psalm cost him too much. William Canton writes:—
"A man lived fifty years—joy dashed with tears;
Loved, toiled; had wife and child, and lost them; died;
And left of all his long life's work one little song.
That lasted—naught beside.
Like the monk Felix's bird, that song was heard;
Doubt prayed, Faith soared. Death smiled itself to sleep;
That song saved souls. You say the man paid stiffly? Nay.
God paid—and thought it cheap."
CHAPTER VIII.
JESUS AND THOMAS.
I have a life in Christ to live,
I have a death in Christ to die;
And must I wait till science give
All doubts a full reply?
Nay, rather while the sea of doubt
Is raging wildly round about,
Questioning of life and death and sin,
Let me but creep within
Thy fold, O Christ! and at thy feet
Take but the lowest seat.
PRINCIPAL SHAIRP.
There is no record of the beginning of the friendship of Jesus and Thomas. We do not know when Thomas became a disciple, nor what first drew him to Jesus. Did a friend bring him? Did he learn of the new rabbi through the fame of him that went everywhere, and then come to him without solicitation? Did he hear him speak one day, and find himself drawn to him by the power of his gracious words? Or did Jesus seek him out in his home or at his work, and call him to be a follower?
We do not know. The manner of his coming is veiled in obscurity. The first mention of his name is in the list of the Twelve. As the apostles were chosen from the much larger company of those who were already disciples, Thomas must have been a follower of Jesus before he was an apostle. He and Jesus had been friends for some time, and there is evidence that the friendship was a very close and tender one. Even in the scant material available for the making up of the story, we find evidence in Thomas of strong loyalty and unwavering devotion, and in Jesus of marvellous patience and gentleness toward his disciple.
We have in the New Testament many wonderfully lifelike portraits. Occurring again and again, they are always easily recognizable. In every mention of Peter, for example, the man is indubitably the same. He is always active, speaking or acting; not always wisely, but in every case characteristically,—impetuous, self-confident, rash, yet ever warm-hearted. We would know him unmistakably in every incident in which he appears, even if his name were not given. John, too, whenever we see him, is always the same,—reverent, quiet, affectionate, trustful, the disciple of love. Andrew appears only a few times, but in each of these cases he is engaged in the same way,—bringing some one to Jesus. Mary of Bethany comes into the story on only three occasions; but always we see her in the same attitude,—at Jesus' feet,—while Martha is ever active in her serving.
The character of Thomas also is sketched in a very striking way. There are but three incidents in which this apostle appears; but in all of these the portrait is the same, and is so clear that even Peter's character is scarcely better known than that of Thomas. He always looks at the dark side. We think of him as the doubter; but his doubt is not of the flippant kind which reveals lack of reverence, ofttimes ignorance and lack of earnest thought; it is rather a constitutional tendency to question, and to wait for proof which would satisfy the senses, than a disposition to deny the facts of Christianity. Thomas was ready to believe, glad to believe, when the proof was sufficient to convince him. Then all the while he was ardently a true and devoted friend of Jesus, attached to him, and ready to follow him even to death.
The first incident in which Thomas appears is in connection with the death of Lazarus. Jesus had now gone beyond the Jordan with his disciples. The Jews had sought to kill him; and he escaped from their hands, and went away for safety. When news of the sickness of Lazarus came, Jesus waited two days, and then said to his disciples, "Let us go into Judea again." The disciples reminded him of the hatred of the Jews, and of their recent attempts to kill him. They thought that he ought not to venture back again into the danger, even for the sake of carrying comfort to the sorrowing Bethany household. Jesus answered with a little parable about one's security while walking during the day. The meaning of the parable was that he had not yet reached the end of his day, and therefore could safely continue the work which had been given him to do. Every man doing God's will is immortal till the work is done. Jesus then announced to his disciples that Lazarus was dead, and that he was going to waken him.
It is at this point that Thomas appears. He said to his fellow-disciples, "Let us also go, that we may die with him." He looked only at the dark side. He took it for granted that if Jesus returned to Judea he would be killed. He forgot for the time the divine power of Jesus, and the divine protection which sheltered him while he was doing the Father's will. He failed to understand the words Jesus had just spoken about his security until the hours of his day were finished. He remembered only the bitterness which the Jews had shown toward Jesus, and their determination to destroy his life. He had no hope that if Jesus returned they would not carry out their wicked purpose. There was no blue in the sky for him. He saw only darkness.
Thomas represents a class of good people who are found in every community. They see only the sad side of life. No stars shine through their cypress-trees. In the time of danger they forget that there are divine refuges into which they may flee and be safe. They know the promises, and often quote them to others; but when trouble comes upon them, all these words of God fade out of their minds. In sorrow they fail to receive any true and substantial comfort from the Scriptures. Hope dies in their hearts when the shadows gather about them. They yield to discouragement, and the darkness blots out every star in their sky. Whatever the trouble may be that comes into their life, they see the trouble only, and fail to perceive the bright light in the cloud.
This habit of mind adds much to life's hardness. Every burden is heavier because of the sad heart that beats under it. Every pain is keener because of the dispiriting which it brings with it. Every sorrow is made darker by the hopelessness with which it is endured. Every care is magnified, and the sweetness of every pleasure is lessened, by this pessimistic tendency. The beauty of the world loses half its charm in the eyes which see all things in the hue of despondent feeling. Slightest fears become terrors, and smallest trials grow into great misfortunes. Our heart makes our world for us; and if the heart be without hope and cheer, the world is always dark. We find in life just what we have the capacity to find. One who is color-blind sees no loveliness in nature. One who has no music in his soul hears no harmonies anywhere. When fear sits regnant on the throne, life is full of alarms.
On the other hand, if the heart be full of hope, every joy is doubled, and half of every trouble vanishes. There are sorrows, but they are comforted. There are bitter cups, but the bitterness is sweetened. There are heavy burdens, but the songful spirit lightens them. There are dangers, but cheerful courage robs them of terror. All the world is brighter when the light of hope shines within.
But we have read only half the story of the fear of Thomas. He saw only danger in the Master's return to Judea. "The Jews will kill him; he will go back to certain death," he said. But Thomas would not forsake Jesus, though he was going straight to martyrdom. "Let us also go, that we may die with him." Thus, mingled with his fear, was a noble and heroic love for Jesus. The hopelessness of Thomas as he thought of Jesus going to Bethany makes his devotion and his cleaving to him all the braver and nobler. He was sure it was a walk to death, but he faltered not in his loyalty.
This is a noble spirit in Thomas, which we would do well to emulate. It is the true soldier spirit. Its devotion to Christ is absolute, and its following unconditional. It has only one motive,—love; and one rule,—obedience. It is not influenced by any question of consequences; but though it be to certain death, it hesitates not. This is the kind of discipleship which the Master demands. He who loves father or mother more than him is not worthy of him. He who hates not his own life cannot be his disciple. A follower of Jesus must be ready and willing to follow him to his cross. Thomas proved his friendship for his Master by a noble heroism. It is the highest test of courage to go forward unfalteringly in the way of duty when one sees only personal loss and sacrifice as the result. The soldier who trembles, and whose face whitens from constitutional physical fear, and who yet marches steadily into the battle, is braver far than the soldier who without a tremor presses into the engagement.
The second time at which Thomas appears is in the upper room, after the Holy Supper had been eaten. Jesus had spoken of the Father's house, and had said that he was going away to prepare a place for his disciples, and that then he would come again to receive them unto himself. Thomas could not understand the Master's meaning, and said, "Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?" He would not say he believed until he saw for himself. That is all that his question in the upper room meant—he wished the Master to make the great teaching a little plainer. It were well if more Christians insisted on finding the ground of their faith, the reasons why they are Christians. Their faith would then be stronger, and less easily shaken. When trouble comes, or any testing, it would continue firm and unmoved, because it rests on the rock of divine truth.
The last incident in the story of Thomas is after the resurrection. The first evening the apostles met in the upper room to talk over the strange things which had occurred that day. For some reason Thomas was not at this meeting. We may infer that his melancholy temperament led him to absent himself. He had loved Jesus deeply, and his sorrow was very great. There had been rumors all day of Christ's resurrection, but Thomas put no confidence in these. Perhaps his despondent disposition made him unsocial, and kept him from meeting with the other apostles, even to weep with them.
That evening Jesus entered through the closed doors, and stood in the midst of the disciples, and greeted them as he had done so often before, "Peace be unto you!" They told Thomas afterwards that they had seen the Lord. But he refused to believe them; that is, he doubted the reality of what they thought they had seen. He said that they had been deceived; and he asserted that he must not only see for himself, but must have the opportunity of subjecting the evidence to the severest test. He must see the print of the nails, and must also be permitted to put his finger into the place.
It is instructive to think of what this doubting disposition of Thomas cost him. First, it kept him from the meeting of the disciples that evening, when all the others came together. He shut himself up with his gloom and sadness. His grief was hopeless, and he would not seek comfort. The consequence was, that when Jesus entered the room, and showed himself to his friends, Thomas missed the revealing which gave them such unspeakable gladness. From that hour their sorrow was changed to joy; but for the whole of another week Thomas remained in the darkness in which the crucifixion had infolded him.
Doubt is always costly. It shuts out heavenly comfort. There are many Christian people who, especially in the first shock of sorrow, have an experience similar to that of Thomas. They shut themselves up with their grief, and refuse to accept the comfort of the gospel of Christ. They turn away their ears from the voices of love which speak to them out of the Bible, and will not receive the divine consolations. The light shines all about them; but they close doors and windows, and keep it from entering the darkened chamber where they sit. The music of peace floats on the air in sweet, entrancing strains, but no gentle note finds its way to their hearts.
Too many Christian mourners fail to find comfort in their sorrow. They believe the great truths of Christianity, that Jesus died for them and rose again; but their faith fails them for the time in the hour of sorest distress. Meanwhile they walk in darkness as Thomas did. On the other hand, those who accept, and let into their hearts the great truths of Christ's resurrection and the immortal life in Christ, feel the pain of parting no less sorely, but they find abundant consolation in the hope of eternal life for those whom they have lost for a time.
We have an illustration of the deep, tender, patient, and wise friendship of Jesus for Thomas in the way he treated this doubt of his apostle. He did not say that if Thomas could not believe the witness of the apostles to his resurrection he must remain in the darkness which his unbelief had made for him. He treated his doubt with exceeding gentleness, as a skilful physician would deal with a dangerous wound. He was in no haste. A full week passed before he did anything. During those days the sad heart had time to react, to recover something of its self-poise. Thomas still persisted in his refusal to believe, but when a week had gone he found his way with the others to their meeting. Perhaps their belief in the Lord's resurrection made such a change in them, so brightened and transformed them, that Thomas grew less positive in his unbelief as he saw them day after day. At least he was ready now to be convinced. He wanted to believe.
That night Jesus came again into the room, the doors being shut, and standing in the midst of his friends, breathed again upon them his benediction of peace. Then he turned to Thomas; and holding out his hands, with the print of the nails in them, he asked him to put the evidences of his resurrection to the very tests he had said he must make before he could believe. Now Thomas was convinced. He did not make the tests he had insisted that he must make. There was no need for it. To look into the face of Jesus, to hear his voice, and to see the prints of the nails in his hands, was evidence enough even for Thomas. All his doubts were swept away. Falling at the Master's feet, he exclaimed, "My Lord and my God!"
Thus the gentleness of Jesus in dealing with his doubts saved Thomas from being an unbeliever. It is a great thing to have a wise and faithful friend when one is passing through an experience of doubt. Many persons are only confirmed in their scepticism by the well-meant but unwise efforts that are made to convince them of the truth concerning which they doubt. It is not argument that they need, but the patience of love, which waits in silence till the right time comes for words, and which then speaks but little. Thomas was convinced, not by words, but by seeing the proofs of Christ's love in the prints of the nails.
We may be glad now that Thomas was hard to convince of the truth of Christ's resurrection. It makes the proofs more indubitable to us that one even of the apostles refused at first to believe, and yet at length was led into triumphant faith. If all the apostles had believed easily, there would have been no comfort in the gospel for those who find it hard to believe, and yet who sincerely want to believe. The fact that one doubted, and even refused to accept the witness of his fellow-apostles, and then at length was led into clear, strong faith, forever teaches that doubt is not hopeless. Ofttimes it may be but a process in the development of faith.
The story of Thomas shows, too, that there may be honest doubt. While he doubted, he yet loved; perhaps no other one of the apostles loved Jesus more than did Thomas. He never made any such bold confession as Peter did, but neither did he ever deny Christ. Thomas has been a comfort to many because he has shown them that they can be true Christians, true lovers of Christ, and yet not be able to boast of their assurance of faith.
No doubt faith is better than questioning, but there may be honest questioning which yet is intensely loyal to Christ. Questioning, too, which is eager to find the truth and rest on the rock, may be better than easy believing, that takes no pains to know the reason of the hope it cherishes, and lightly recites the noble articles of a creed it has never seriously studied. Tennyson, in "In Memoriam," tells the story of a faith that grew strong through its doubting.
You say, but with no touch of scorn,
Sweet-hearted, you, whose light-blue eyes
Are tender over drowning flies,
You tell me, doubt is devil-born.
I know not: one indeed I knew
In many a subtle question versed,
Who touched a jarring lyre at first,
But ever strove to make it true:
Perplext in faith, but pure in deeds,
At last he beat his music out.
There lives more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds.
He fought his doubts and gathered strength;
He would not make his judgment blind,
He faced the spectres of the mind
And laid them: thus he came at length
To find a stronger faith his own;
And power was with him in the night,
Which makes the darkness and the light,
And dwells not in the light alone,
But in the darkness and the cloud,
As over Sinai's peaks of old,
While Israel made their gods of gold,
Although the trumpet blew so loud.
That which saved Thomas was his deep, strong friendship for Christ. "The characteristic of Thomas," says Ian Maclaren, "is not that he doubted,—that were an easy passport to religion,—but that he doubted and loved. His doubt was the measure of his love; his doubt was swallowed up in love." If friendship for Christ be loyal and true, we need not look upon questioning as disloyalty; it may be but love finding the way up the rugged mountain-side to the sunlit summit of a glorious faith. There is a scepticism whose face is toward wintriness and death; but there is a doubt which is looking toward the sun and toward all blessedness.
Thomas teaches us that one may look on the dark side and yet be a Christian, an ardent lover of Jesus, ready to die for him. But we must admit that this is not the best way to live. No one would say that Thomas was the ideal among the apostles, that his character was the most beautiful, his life the noblest and the best. Faith is better than doubt, and confidence better than questioning. It is better to be a sunny Christian, rejoicing, songful, happy, than a sad, gloomy, despondent Christian. It makes one's own life sweeter and more beautiful. Then it makes others happier. A gloomy Christian casts dark shadows wherever he goes; a sunny Christian is a benediction to every life he touches.
CHAPTER IX.
JESUS' UNREQUITED FRIENDSHIPS.
"Friend, my feet bleed.
Open thy door to me and comfort me."
I will not open; trouble me no more.
Go on thy way footsore;
I will not rise and open unto thee.
"Then it is nothing to thee? Open, see
Who stands to plead with thee.
Open, lest I should pass thee by, and thou
One day entreat my face
And howl for grace,
And I be deaf as thou art now.
Open to me."
CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.
There is a great deal of unrequited love in this world. There are hearts that love with all the strength of purest and holiest affection, whose love seems to meet no requital. There is much unrequited mother-love and father-love. Parents live for their children. In helpless infancy they begin to pour out their affection on them. They toil for them, suffer for them, deny themselves to provide comforts for them, bear their burdens, watch beside them when they are sick, pray for them, and teach them. Parent-love is likest God's love of all earthly affections. It is one of the things in humanity which at its best seems to have come from the Fall almost unimpaired. Much parent-love is worthily honored and fittingly requited. Few things in this world are more beautiful than the devotion of children to parents which one sees in some homes. But not always is there such return. Too often is this almost divine love unrequited.
Much philanthropic love also is unrequited. There are men who spend all their life in doing good, and then meet no return. Men have served their country with loyalty and disinterestedness, and have received no reward—perhaps have been left to suffering, and have died in poverty, neglected and forgotten; too often have lain in prison, or been put to death, or exiled by the country which was indebted to their patriotism and loyal service for much of its glory and greatness. Many hearts break because of men's ingratitude.
Jesus was the world's greatest benefactor. No other man ever loved the race, or could have loved it, as he did. He was the divine messenger who came to save the world. His whole life was a revealing of love. It was the love of God too,—a love of infinite depth and strength and tenderness, and not any merely human love, however rich and faithful it might be, that was manifested in Jesus Christ. Yet much of his wonderful love was unrequited. "He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not." A few individuals recognized him and accepted his love; but the great masses of the people paid him no heed, saw no beauty in him, rejected the blessings he bore and proffered to all, and let his love waste itself in unavailing yearnings and beseechings. Then one cruel day they nailed him on a cross, thinking to quench the affection of his mighty heart.
There are many illustrations of the unrequiting of the holy friendship of Jesus. The treatment he received at Nazareth was one instance. He had been brought up among the people. They had seen his beautiful life during the thirty years he had lived in the village. They had known him as a child when he played in their streets. They had known him as a youth and young man in his noble strength. They had known him as a carpenter when day after day he wrought among them in humble toil.
It is interesting to think of the sinless life of Jesus all these years. There was no halo about his head but the shining of manly character. There were no miracles wrought by his hands but the miracles of duty, faithful service, and gentle kindness. Yet we cannot doubt that his life in Nazareth was one of rare grace and beauty, marked by perfect unselfishness and great helpfulness.
By and by he went away from Nazareth to begin his public ministry as the Messiah. From that time the people saw him no more. The carpenter shop was closed, and the tools lay unused on the bench. The familiar form appeared no more on the streets. A year or more passed, and one day he came back to visit his old neighbors. He stayed a little while, and on the Sabbath was at the village church as had been his wont when his home was at Nazareth. When the opportunity was given him, he unrolled the Book of Isaiah, and read the passage which tells of the anointing of the Messiah, and gives the wonderful outline of his ministry. When he had finished the reading, he told the people that this prophecy was now fulfilled in their ears. That is, he said that he was the Messiah whose anointing and work the prophet had foretold. For a time the people listened spellbound to his gracious words, and then they began to grow angry, that he whom they knew as the carpenter of their village should make such an astounding claim. They rose up in wrath, thrust him out of the synagogue, and would have hurled him over the precipice had he not eluded them and gone on his way.
He had come to them in love, bearing rich blessings; but they drove him away with the blessings. He had come to heal their sick, to cure their blind and lame, to cleanse their lepers, to comfort their sorrowing ones; but he had to go away and leave these works of mercy unwrought, while the sufferers continued to bear their burdens. His friendship for his old neighbors was unrequited.
Another instance of unrequited friendship in the life of Jesus was in the case of the rich young man who came to him. He had many excellent traits of character, and was also an earnest seeker after the truth. We are distinctly told that Jesus loved him. Thus he belongs with Martha and Mary and Lazarus, of whom the same was said. But here, again, the love was unrequited. The young man was deeply interested in Jesus, and wanted to go with him; but he could not pay the price, and turned and went away.
It is interesting to think what might have been the result if he had chosen Christ and gone with him. He might have occupied an important place in the early church, and his name might have lived through all future generations. But he loved his money too much to give it up for Christ, and rejected the way of the cross marked out for him. He refused the friendship of Jesus, and thus threw away all that was best in life. In shutting love out of his heart, he shut himself out from love.
Of all the examples of unrequited friendship in the story of Jesus, that of Judas is the saddest. We do not know the beginning of the story of his discipleship, when Judas first came to Jesus, or who brought him. But he must have been a follower some time before he was chosen to be an apostle. Jesus thought over the names of those who had left all to be with him. Then after a night of prayer he chose twelve of these to be his special messengers and witnesses. He loved them all, and took them into very close relations.
Think what a privilege it was for these men to live with Jesus. They heard all his words. They saw every phase of his life. Some friends it is better not to know too intimately. They are not as good in private as they are in public. Their life does not bear too close inspection. We discover in them dispositions, habits, ways, tempers, feelings, motives, which dim the lustre we see in them at greater distance. Intimacy weakens the friendship. But, on the other hand, there are those who, the more we see of their private life, the more we love them. Close association reveals loveliness of character, fineness of spirit, richness of heart, sweetness of disposition—habits, feelings, tempers, noble self-denials, which add to the attractiveness of the life and the charm of our friend's personality. We may be sure that intimacy with Jesus only made him appear all the more winning and beautiful to his friends. Judas lived in the warmth of this wondrous love, under the influence of this gracious personality, month after month. He witnessed the pure and holy life of Jesus in all its manifold phases, heard his words, and saw his works. Doubtless, too, in his individual relation with the Master, he received many marks of affection and personal friendship.
A careful reading of the Gospels shows that Judas was frequently warned of the very sin which in the end wrought his ruin. Continually Jesus spoke of the danger of covetousness. In the Sermon on the Mount he exhorted his disciples to lay up their treasure, not upon earth, but in heaven, and said that no one could serve God and mammon. It was just this that Judas was trying to do. In more than one parable the danger of riches was emphasized. Can we doubt that in all these reiterations and warnings on the one subject, Judas was in the Master's mind? He was trying in the faithfulness of loyal friendship to save him from the sin which was imperilling his very life.
But Judas resisted all the mighty love of Christ. It made no impression upon him; he was unaffected by it. In his heart there grew on meanwhile, unchecked, unhindered, his terrible greed for money. First it made him a thief. The money given to Jesus by his friends to provide for his wants, or to use for the poor, Judas, who was the treasurer, began at length to purloin for himself. This was the first step. The next was the selling of his Master for thirty pieces of silver. This was a more fearful fruit of his nourished greed than the purloining was. It is bad enough to steal. It is a base form of stealing which robs a church treasury as Judas did. But to take money as the price of betraying a friend—could any sin be baser? Could any crime be blacker than that? To take money as the price of betraying a friend in whose confidence one has lived for years, at whose table one has eaten day after day, in the blessing of whose friendship one has rested for months and years—are there words black enough to paint the infamy of such a deed?
All the participators in the crime of that Good Friday wear a peculiar brand of infamy as they are portrayed on the pages of history; but among them all, the most despicable, the one whose name bears the deepest infamy, is Judas, an apostle turned traitor, for a few miserable coins betraying his best friend into the hands of malignant foes.
This is the outcome of the friendship of Jesus for Judas; this was the fruit of those years of affection, cherishing, patient teaching. Think what Judas might have been. He was chosen and called to be an apostle. There was no reason in the heart of Jesus why Judas might not have been true and worthy. Sin is not God's plan for any life. Treachery and infamy were not in God's purpose for Judas. Jesus would not have chosen him for one of the Twelve if it had not been possible for him to be a good and true man. Judas fell because he had never altogether surrendered himself to Christ. He tried to serve God and mammon; but both could not stay in his heart, and instead of driving out mammon, mammon drove out Christ.
This suggests to us what a battlefield the human heart sometimes is—a
Waterloo where destinies are settled. God or mammon—which? That is
the question every soul must answer. How goes the battle in your soul?
Who is winning on your field—Christ or money? Christ or pleasure?
Christ or sin? Christ or self? Judas lost the battle; the Devil won.
A picture in Brussels represents Judas wandering about the night after the betrayal. By chance he comes upon the workmen who have been preparing the cross for Jesus. A fire burning close by throws its weird light on the faces of the men who are now sleeping. The face of Judas is somewhat in the shade; but one sees on it remorse and agony, as the traitor's eyes fall upon the cross and the tools which have been used in making it,—the cross to which his treason had doomed his friend. But though suffering in the torments of a guilty conscience, he still tightly clutches his money-bag as he hurries on into the night. The picture tells the story of the fruit of Judas's sin,—the money-bag, with eighteen dollars and sixty cents in it, and even that soon to be cast away in the madness of despair.
Unrequited friendship! Yes; and in shutting out that blessed friendship, Judas shut out hope. Longfellow puts into his mouth the despairing words:—
"Lost, lost, forever lost! I have betrayed
The innocent blood …
* * *
Too late! too late! I shall not see him more
Among the living. That sweet, patient face
Will nevermore rebuke me, nor those lips
Repeat the words, 'One of you shall betray me.'"
The great lesson from all this is the peril of rejecting the friendship of Jesus Christ. In his friendship is the only way to salvation, the only way of obtaining eternal life. He calls men to come to him, to follow him, to be his friends; and thus alone can they come unto God, and be received into his family.
There is something appalling in the revealing which this truth teaches,—the power each soul possesses of shutting out all the love of God, of resisting the infinite blessing of the friendship of Christ. It is possible for us to be near to Christ through all our life, with his grace flowing about us like an ocean, and yet to have a heart that remains unblessed by divine love. We may make God's love in vain, wasted, as sunshine is wasted that falls upon desert sands, so far as we are concerned. The love that we do not requite with love, that does not get into our heart to warm, soften, and enrich it, and to mellow and bless our life, is love poured out in vain. It is made in vain by our unbelief. We may make even the dying of Jesus for us in vain,—a waste of precious life, so far as we are concerned. It is in vain for us that Jesus died if we do not let his love into our heart.
Ofttimes the unrequiting of human love makes the heart bitter. When holy friendship has been despised, rejected, and cast away, when one has loved, suffered, and sacrificed in vain, receiving only ingratitude and wrong in return for love's most sacred gifts freely lavished, the danger is that the heart may lose its sweetness, and grow cold, hard, and misanthropic. But not thus was the heart of Jesus affected by the unrequiting of his love and friendship. One Judas in the life of most men would have ended the whole career of generous kindness, drying up the fountains of affection, thus robbing those who would come after of the wealth of tenderness which ought to have been theirs. But through all the unrequiting and resisting of its love, the heart of Jesus still remained gentle as a mother's, rich in its power to love, and sweet in its spirit.
This is one of the great problems of true living,—how to keep the heart warm, gentle, compassionate, kind, full of affection's best and truest helpfulness, even amid life's hardest experiences. We cannot live and not at some time suffer wrong. We will meet injustice, however justly we ourselves may live. We will find a return of ingratitude many a time when we have done our best for others. Favors rendered are too easily forgotten by many people. There are few of us who do not remember helping others in time of great need and distress, only to lose their friendship in the end, perhaps, as a consequence of our serving them in their need. Sometimes the only return for costly kindness is cruel unkindness.
It is easy to allow such unrequiting, such ill treatment of love, to embitter the fountain of the heart's affection; but this would be to miss the true end of living, which is to get good and not evil to ourselves from every experience through which we pass. No ingratitude, injustice, or unworthiness in those to whom we try to do good, should ever be allowed to turn love's sweetness into bitterness in us. Like fresh-water springs beside the sea, over which the brackish tide flows, but which when the bitter waters have receded are found sweet as ever, so should our hearts remain amid all experiences of love's unrequiting, ever sweet, thoughtful, unselfish, and generous.
CHAPTER X.
JESUS AND THE BETHANY SISTERS.
Her eyes are homes of silent prayer,
Nor other thought her mind admits
But, he was dead, and there he sits,
And he that brought him back is there.
Then one deep love doth supersede
All other, when her ardent gaze
Roves from the living brother's face,
And rests upon the Life indeed.
TENNYSON.
The story of Jesus and the Bethany home is intensely interesting. Every thoughtful Christian has a feeling of gratitude in his heart when he remembers how much that home added to the comfort of the Master by means of the hospitality, the shelter, and the love it gave to him. One of the legends of Brittany tells us that on the day of Christ's crucifixion, as he was on his way to his cross, a bird, pitying the weary sufferer bearing his heavy burden, flew down, and plucked away one of the thorns that pierced his brow. As it did so, the blood spurted out after the thorn, and splashed the breast of the bird. Ever since that day the bird has had a splash of red on its bosom, whence it is called robin-redbreast. Certainly the love of the Bethany home drew from the breast of Jesus many a thorn, and blessed his heart with many a joy.
We have three glimpses within the doors of this home when the loved guest was there. The first shows us the Master and his disciples one day entering the village. It was Martha who received him. Martha was the mistress of the house. "She had a sister called Mary," a younger sister.
Then we have a picture as if some one had photographed the scene. We see Mary drawing up a low stool, and sitting down at the Master's feet to listen to his words. We see Martha hurrying about the house, busy preparing a meal for the visitors who had come in suddenly. This was a proper thing to do; it was needful that hospitality be shown. There is a word in the record, however, which tells us that Martha was not altogether serene as she went about her work. "Martha was cumbered about much serving." A marginal reading gives, "was distracted."
Perhaps there are many modern Christian housekeepers who would be somewhat cumbered, or distracted too, if thirteen hungry men dropped in suddenly some day, and they had to entertain them, preparing them a meal. Still, the lesson unmistakably is that Martha should not have been fretted; that she should have kept sweet amid all the pressure of work that so burdened her.
It was not quite right for her to show her impatience with Mary as she did. Coming into the room, flushed and excited, and seeing Mary sitting quietly and unconcernedly at the Rabbi's feet, drinking in his words, she appealed to Jesus, "Lord, dost thou not care that my sister did leave me to serve alone? bid her therefore that she help me."
I am not sure that Martha was wrong or unreasonable in thinking that Mary should have helped her. Jesus did not say she was wrong; he only reminded Martha that she ought not to let things fret and vex her. "Martha, Martha, thou art anxious and troubled about many things." It was not her serving that he reproved, but the fret that she allowed to creep into her heart.