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As you are well apprised, beginning with Revelation, we have expounded the books of the New Testament in a reverse order. The primary reason for this procedure was the realization of my incompetence for the great and responsible work of expounding God’s Word, and my consequent dread of the Savior’s ministry. Feeling more freedom in an attempt to write up the ministry of the apostles, I began with them, thinking perhaps I would never be able to reach the Lord’s ministry. But now His good providence has permitted me to expound the whole New Testament in the five volumes, which (D.V.) you have read, and make this second pilgrimage to the Holy Land by way of preparation for the great and responsible work of expounding the personal ministry of our Lord.

As the Holy Spirit is really the Author of the whole Bible, speaking through the prophets and apostles, the ministry of Christ is no exception, as He never began till the Holy Ghost came down from heaven and filled Him, immediately after John, His forerunner, had, by the ordinance of baptism, initiated Him into His official Messiahship. Henceforth He ever “preached with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.” While admitting these facts, we must recognize in Jesus the only absolutely perfect Man that ever trod the earth or ever will. He alone was perfectly free from all human infirmity. While in case of the apostles, though encumbered with infirmities, they were so superseded by grace as not only to be perfectly subordinated to the Holy Ghost, but doubtless, in many cases, so utilized by Him as in the end to magnify the grace of God, yet when we sit under the ministry of Jesus, there is manifest a Divine majesty, a sweetness of spirit, a depth of love, a tenderness of sympathy, a grandeur of omnipotence, and a majesty of execution, descending to profoundest depths, mounting to loftiest altitudes, broadening to grandest latitudes, and sweeping on through illimitable longitudes, thus culminating in a beauty, grandeur, sublimity, and glory transcending the possibility of all human utterances. Hence, with deepest humiliation and profoundest realization of immeasurable responsibility, I enter upon this humble attempt to expound the Gospel of Jesus, as revealed to us through the instrumentality of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

Among all the commentaries that have ever been written, expository of our Lord’s ministry, no one has been harmonical. What do you mean by a Harmonical Commentary? I mean the ministry of our Lord expounded as it took place, whether given by one, two, three, or all of the inspired writers.

We have wonderful favor in our Lord’s Gospel in the fact that it is so brief that almost every one may conveniently, at least substantially, commit it all to memory. Besides, we have it by four different authors, differing from each other by personal, experimental, and educational idiosyncrasies. This is a great blessing to us, as we have the same truth given from a diversity of attitudes, the style of the writer adding variety, vivacity, and simplicity.

Some things none but Matthew wrote; others, Mark alone wrote; others, Luke exclusively has given us; while John is quite isolated, running much of the time alone. Matthew wrote for the Jews in the Holy Land, fifteen years after the ascension of our Lord, being himself an eye-witness, as he was one of the original twelve apostles called by the Savior in the city of Capernaum. Mark was not an apostle, but is believed to have served as amanuensis of Peter, writing his Gospel for the Romans in Rome, as dictated by Peter, thirty years after the ascension of our Lord. Luke was a physician, in the city of Antioch, Syria, and of course practicing medicine there, during the ministry of John the Baptist and our Savior, as we have no mention of him until some time after Christianity had reached Antioch, Paul and Barnabas having preached there a whole year, and made their first great evangelistic tour through Cyprus, Pamphylia, and Lycaonia, returning back to Antioch. Setting out on a second tour, Luke is first mentioned as a comrade of Paul, along with Timothy and Silas, and serving him as amanuensis. He wrote the Gospel that bears his name for the Greeks, while with Paul in Corinth, twenty-five years after the ascension of our Lord. John, like Matthew, was one of the twelve apostles, and wrote his Gospel for the edification of the Christians while at Ephesus, about sixty-five years after the ascension of the Savior.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke all wrote historically. Hence they run much together. John did not write historically, but spiritually and experimentally, for the edification of the Christians, and especially their fortification against dangerous heresies, which had already begun to creep in.

A Harmonical Commentary is something “new under the sun,” in the simple fact that there has never been anything of the kind written and published. At least, I have made diligent inquiry, and have never been able to hear of any. You will find the advantages of a Harmonical Commentary on the Gospels decisive and inestimable; e.g., as you all know, reading Clarke, Whedon, or any other Commentary, you get along nicely, and enjoy everything through Matthew; then in Mark they are constantly turning you back to Matthew. This becomes irksome, and the subsequent expositions, to some extent, become monotonous. There is nothing of this kind in the Harmonial Commentary, as the line of exegesis does not follow Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John, but Jesus only, and taking in the writers as they come, incidentally, in the order of events.

While the Harmonical Commentary will expound every deliverance of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, it will give them incidentally, in the order of time, every one subsidiary to the Lord Himself. (a) Everything revealed by Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John will be expounded in the order of time as the events transpire in the ministry of our Savior. (b) Repetitions will be diligently avoided; i.e. , when the same thing is said by more than one, there will only be one exegesis given. (c) The chronological coincidence of the items given by different writers will be diligently observed, so as to keep prominent before the eye of the reader the unbroken, consecutive history of our Lord’s ministry.

In studying the Commentary, you would do well to have the Gospels present, so you can see that everything is expounded, recognize, and keep in mind the consecutive order of the wonderful, eventful ministry of our Lord. As a matter of convenience and economy, we will use abbreviations of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Unless you bear this fact in mind, you may realize confusion, somewhat to your disadvantage. For Matthew, we will only write the single letter M.; for Mark, we will write the two letters Mk.; for Luke, we will write the single letter L.; and for John, we will only write J.

I feel sure that you will not only be interested, but much edified, in the wonderful preaching and mighty miracles of our Savior. I suppose you have not only read the other five Commentaries, but “Footprints of Jesus,” in which you find that I have been on His track, beginning at Caesarea-Philippi, the northern terminus of His ministry, and following Him round and round over the country, and two days sailing on the Sea of Galilee, the northern center of His ministry and really His home after they rejected Him at Nazareth. On His track, in that far off land, we dictated the Gospel Commentaries to our son-in-law, Rev. F. M. Hill, one of my traveling companions, who wrote them in brief; but now, in the quietude of my dear “Old Kentucky Home,” we rewrite and prepare them for the printers.

The end for which I made this second tour to the Holy Land was, that I might explore more extensively the track of our Savior, and especially that, by walking round in His footprints, and lingering at those places rendered historic and hallowed by His conception, birth, residence, baptism, crucifixion, interment, resurrection, and ascension, that God, in His mercy, might favor me with a deeper insight into Divine things; a more thorough illumination of the Holy Spirit; a clearer apprehension of Divine truth; a more vivid realization of my own momentous responsibility in my humble effort to expound His Word; a deeper crucifixion in my own interior spirit; a more thorough annihilation of the self life; a more total eclipse of the world, with all its vanities and emoluments; and a profounder humiliation of my own soul before God, — thus, not only more thoroughly preparing me for the awful responsibility of expounding to immortal intelligences the Word of my Lord, but a more thorough qualification to meet the thousands of people who read these Commentaries at the judgment seat of Christ.

Now, reader, as you, in the good providence of God, shall examine the subsequent pages of this Commentary, I hope you will have but one end in view, and that is, to know the Word of Him “who spake as never man spake.” It is understood that a Holiness Commentary is rigidly nonsectarian and undenominational, but simply an explanation of the Bible, whose central idea is “holiness, without which no one shall see the Lord.” I hope no one reading these Commentaries will endeavor to utilize them to bolster up a sectarian dogma; e.g., the baptismal controversy. The Calvinian or the Arminmanas we are reading and expounding the wonderful words and mighty works of our Lord and Savior, I hope you will see Jesus only in all these pages; the heart cry for a greater nearness to God, a deeper similitude to Jesus, and a richer enduement of the Holy Ghost may simultaneously ascend to the mercy-seat. We are sweeping with avalanche velocity into eternity. We have not time to preach anything but Jesus and His great salvation.

The great end for which these Commentaries are written is not only the salvation and sanctification of the readers, but especially the evangelization of the world. “The Lord is nigh.” We need millions of blood-washed and fire-baptized men and women to go to the ends of the earth, and preach the everlasting gospel, thus fulfilling the commission Jesus gave us before he ascended into heaven, assuring us that He will come in His glory so soon as we do this work. Not only do men and women need the sanctification and enduement of the Holy Ghost, but the Word of God is the gospel; they must understand it in order successfully to preach it to others. Hence, the explanation of God’s Word is a sine qua non to every person who would preach it to others.

The world is full of learning. Infidels, skeptics, and heretics set their traps on all sides to catch the herald of God’s truth, and run him into entanglements and sophistical dilemmas. Great human learning is not necessary to the preacher, but a knowledge of God’s Word is indispensable. Without this knowledge, and the sanctifying grace of God, the preacher gets caught and hung up, a spectacle of popular ridicule, before he is aware, and in this way is gobbled up by Satan. If these Commentaries are read, in the providence and grace of God, they will make multitudes of preachers. God has given you intellect enough to understand them.

Millions, in all lands, are perishing for the bread of life; i.e. , the precious Word of God. Nothing but the Word is the gospel, and nothing but the gospel can save souls. Many Churches, this day, are starving to death for the bread of life; the multitudes in Satan’s dark world, and the heathen millions, dead and dying. The great responsibility of giving the gospel to the world devolves on the holiness people. The worldly Churches will never do it. A dead man can not help his neighbor. If you are in the swelling flood, you can not rescue others sinking into a watery grave. God needs all the holy people on the earth to go and preach the everlasting gospel to the dying millions. The evangelization of a lost world is the grand incentive for which I have devoted years of toil, and foregone the perils of sea and land, to give you these Commentaries; not simply that you may get saved, but that you may go and blow the silver trumpet amid the tombs of spiritual death, and see the resurrection power, that lost millions may be saved, heaven populated, and the return of our King expedited. (CHAPTER) - THE INTRODUCTION Luke 1:1-4. “Since indeed many have undertaken to set forth a narrative concerning the things which have been fulfilled among us, as those being eye-witnesses from the beginning and ministers of the Word, have handed down to us; it seemed good to me also, following all things accurately from the beginning, consecutively to write unto thee, O most noble Theophilus, in order that you may well understand the certainty of the histories concerning which you have been catechetically instructed.” We see from this statement that Luke was not one of the old disciples of our Lord, neither was he an eye-witness of His mighty works; as we never hear of him till the second evangelistic tour of Paul, in which he becomes one of his helpers, about A.D. 42. Doubtless he was a practicing physician in Antioch during the entire period of our Lord’s ministry. We have three reasons for accepting the Gospel of Luke without the slightest discount: 1. He received all of his information from the veritable disciples of our Savior, who were eye-witnesses to His mighty works; 2. Paul was his constant companion, and, as we all believe, the dictator of his writings; 3. The plenary inspiration of the Holy Ghost settles forever all controversy in reference to Biblical authenticity. 2 Timothy 3:16: “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.”

Theophilus literally means “God breathed,” involving the clear and unequivocal revealed truth that all Scripture was breathed into the different authors by the Almighty. Hence the verbal and plenary inspiration of the Bible is positively and unequivocally revealed. The rapid spread of infidelity is one of the omens of the last days and the near coming of the Lord. Semi-infidelity, admitting a kind of substantial inspiration, is rapidly filling the pulpits. The true teaching of the Bible is, that “all Scripture” — i.e. , every word — is breathed into the writer by the Holy Spirit. Hence the great importance of understanding the original, because there the plenary verbal inspiration alone is to be found, translations only carrying with them this inspiration in a general, substantial sense, as they literalize the original.

Theophilus was a name so common in the gospel ages that we can have no idea who is personally alluded to, but doubtless some noble Christian friend of the writer. Bear in mind that Luke dedicates this Gospel to this noble Christian, Theophilus. As the word means “Lover of God,” it follows, as the legitimate sequence, that this Gospel is dedicated to all the lovers of God. I hope, reader, that includes you.

OLD TESTAMENT SAINTS 5. John the Baptist was a bonafide Aaronic priest in a pre-eminent sense, both his father and his mother belonging to the family of Aaron. 6. “They were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.” While the rank and file of the priesthood, as well as the membership, had degenerated into dead formality and hollow hypocrisy, yet there were a few paragon saints, scattered here and there, in the Jewish Church at the time of our Lord’s advent. They enjoyed the glorious honor of receiving the Christ of prophecy, and introducing Him to the world — a peculiar honor, which God conferred upon all Israel; but, through blind unbelief, pride, and disobedience, they all forfeited it except Zacharias and Elizabeth, Joseph and Mary, Simeon and Anna, and a few others, dispersed hither and thither in the kingdom of Israel. The phraseology in reference to Zacharias and Elizabeth is such that we must conclude they enjoyed the sanctified experience. It seems, however, that Elizabeth enjoyed a deeper spirituality and a brighter type of faith than her husband, who certainly was not free from vacillation. 7. Sterility among the Hebrews was deprecated, not only as a calamity, but an opprobrium, as, in that case, there must follow a forfeiture of their inheritance in Israel as well as the hope of the honored progenitorship of Christ. 8. Since the priests had become so numerous, the institution of the sacerdotal divisions and courses by Abia had obtained, pursuant to which every priest must await his time to officiate in the temple. 9,10. Only the priests were admitted into the temple proper, the multitudes remaining out, having access to the great brazen altar, on which they offered their sacrifices, while the priests within the temple burnt incense to the Lord. On the present occasion, Zacharias was burning the holy incense to the Lord in the temple, and all the people were praying without, at the hour of incense; i.e. , nine o’clock in the morning. 11. “The angel of the Lord appeared, standing on the right hand of the altar of incense: Zacharias seeing him, was excited, and fear fell on him.” The position occupied by the advocate in court is always on the righthand side of the judge. Gabriel and Michael are the two great archangels prominent throughout the Bible; the latter always appearing in the interest of the Divine government, and the former in behalf of humanity. 12,13. We see here that Zacharias and Elizabeth had prayed much that God might remove the sterility and give them posterity. As they are now quite old, the faith of Zacharias had much waned, while that of Elizabeth was stalwart and vigorous. “Thou shalt call his name John.” John does not occur in the Old Testament, being here given for the first time by the archangel. It means the grace of God, because John the Baptist was the harbinger of that wonderful grace which came to redeem the whole world from endless death. 14. The birth of John the Baptist was the occasion of general rejoicing among all the consanguinity of Zacharias and Elizabeth, as well as the more spiritual people enjoying a degree of insight into the things of God, who entertained hopeful apprehension that a mighty prophet was thus born into Israel. 15. “For he shall be great before the Lord.” John the Baptist, the last of all the Old Testament prophets, was truly the greatest, being more than a prophet; i.e. , the forerunner and introducer of Christ. “And he shall not drink wine and strong drink.” John was a Nazarite unto the Lord, living exceedingly abstemious, and a total abstainant from everything calculated to intoxicate. The Nazarite of the Old Dispensation was identical with the sanctified man of the gospel age. Samson was a Nazarite, this being the secret of his wonderful strength. “He shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from the womb of his mother.” Here we have an actual case of sanctified infancy, illustrating the gracious possibility of having our infants filled with the Holy Ghost. Doubtless this will become the normal state during the glorious Millennial Theocracy. 16. “And he shall turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God.” John the Baptist was a wonderful preacher, his stentorian voice pealing into the popular ear after a prophetical interregnum of four hundred years, thus arousing Israel from her long sleep, emptying the cities and populating the desert, with the spellbound multitudes, listening with burning hearts and penitent spirits to the mighty and irresistible appeals of this wonderful prophet of the wilderness. 17. “He shall go before His face in the spirit and dynamite of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the understanding of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” The great and sweeping revival which broke out under the preaching of John the Baptist, stirring the whole nation from center to circumference, was the very thing to bring the people down into the dust of humiliation, and thus prepare them for the grandest opportunity the world had seen in four thousand years.

DOUBT & DUMBNESS ALWAYS CO-EXISTENT 18-20. Here we see that Zacharias evinced his doubt of Gabriel’s communication by asking a sign. O how many people now doubt God and wait for signs, instead of taking Him at His word and rejoicing in His promises! The result in the case of Zacharias was, that he became dumb, and so remained till the birth of John the Baptist. If you ever doubt God, you will forfeit your testimony, and become a poor dummy in the meetings. You can recognize it definitely in all cases. So fast as the people give way to doubt, they forfeit their testimony, becoming dumb. Real faith always tells its own story. How common to find whole Churches dumb, thus evidencing the lamentable fact that, if they ever had faith, they have permitted the enemy to steal it away from them! Without faith there is no salvation. Hence you see that all dumb Churches are proper missionary ground. You must get their tongues loose, or they forfeit the hope of salvation. 21-23. Here we see that the words of Gabriel were signally verified when Zacharias, sure enough, was dumb, because he had disbelieved the word of the Lord spoken by the archangel. Be sure you believe all of God’s Word, and keep your testimony ever ringing clear, as otherwise you forfeit your salvation. 24,25. Here we find that when Elizabeth realized pregnancy, she went into retirement five months. Why was this? Evidently that she might enjoy uninterrupted communion with God, fasting, praying, and meditating, thus sinking away into His will, adoring His majesty, and contemplating His glory; meanwhile seeking that extraordinary enduement of grace requisite to qualify her for the immeasurable responsibilities of motherhood, and especially the maternity, training, and education of such a man as she knew, by the revelation of Gabriel, that her son would be. In that age of the world, and the ensuing fifteen hundred years, monastic seclusion for spiritual blessings was very common. We seriously feel the need of it now, in this age of superficiality. Nothing is really so much needed on the part of God’s people, and especially the ministry of God’s people, at the present day, as uninterrupted communion with God. Certainly the reproach of her sterility was gloriously removed in the birth of such a man as John the Baptist, the prince of prophets, and even more the precursor of the world’s Redeemer. We have in the birth of John the Baptist a repetition of that supernatural intervention of the Holy Ghost which characterized the birth of Isaac. In that case, however, the faith of Abraham was robust and triumphant, that of Sarah somewhat staggering through unbelief; whereas, in the case of John the Baptist, Zacharias’s faith flickered seriously, while that of Elizabeth is unimpeached, and, as we have good reason to believe, was athletic throughout.

THE ANNUNCIATION TO MARY 26-30. When I visited Nazareth, I spent some time in the Church of the Annunciation, quite magnificent and capacious, said to stand on the identical spot where the angel Gabriel delivered the wonderful tidings to Mary. Here we have it stated positively that Joseph, the husband of Mary, was a descendant of David. While the genealogy of our Savior recognizes the necessity of Mary’s personal identity with David’s family, and it is so taken for granted, yet it is not directly revealed, except in her wifehood to Joseph; as you must remember the institution of matrimony actually identifies husband and wife, “They two shall be one flesh.” In the recognition of this absolute unification through the institution of matrimony, we must concede Mary’s identity with the family of David. 31. “And thou shalt call His name Jesus.” This name is eminently significant of His office and mission to save the whole world, as it is a Greek word, and means Savior, THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST 32-34. “He shall be called Great and the Son of the Highest; the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of His father David, and of His kingdom there shall be no end.” I see no possibility of satisfying these plain and unequivocal affirmations of inspired truth by a simple reference to His spiritual kingdom, which was a glorious verity before David was born, and will be forever. One line of Biblical exegetes spiritualize all the literal Scriptures, while their opponents literalize all, the tendency being to materialistic infidelity, and that of the fornier into a dreamy Utopianism, doing away with the material, universe, and running into the vagaries of idealism. While David’s throne was a temporal reality, visible, tangible, and actual, it was not his own, as he was merely the executive of the theocracy — a man after God’s own heart, because he did God’s will. ( Acts 13:22.) Therefore we are bound to conclude that David’s great Son and Successor will restore the theocracy of which David was the executive, extended over, not only this world, but, as it already prevails, over all other worlds, and reign forever. The magnitude of the Divine attributes, administration, grace, and glory is so incomprehensible by human intellect as to superinduce a constant liability on our part to run into the heresy of minification. Good Lord deliver us! Let us take the Word as we find it, if it decapitates all of our idols!

MARY’S SUBMISSION 34-38. “And Mary said, Behold the handmaiden of the Lord: may it he unto me according to thy word.” Good Lord, give us the faith of Mary, that we may perfectly submit to Thy Word and will, regardless of consequences!

Perfect submission is the indefeasible fulcrum on which rests the Archimedean lever by which we tilt the world all out of the heart. In this case, you see, Mary must take the risk of the deepest disgrace in worldly estimation and really the liability of martyrdom as the law specified the penalty of death for prostitution in Israel. Mary’s faith here leaps above every intimidation, and soars to the very pinnacle of victory. 39-45. It is about a hundred miles, through a rough, mountainous country, from Nazareth to Jutta, the home of Elizabeth, in the tribe of Judah. Upon the annunciation of Gabriel, and the information in reference to Elizabeth, her relative, Mary immediately set out on that long journey, walking, riding a donkey, or perhaps a camel, in order to visit her at her home. It here says that she came into the hill-country with haste, into a city of Judah. On arrival at the house of Elizabeth, wonderful manifestations of the Divine presence transpire. Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Ghost — i.e. , the spirit of prophecy comes on her, and she speaks fluently with a loud voice: “Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord may come unto me? For, behold, when the voice of thy salutation came into my ears, the infant in my womb leaped with joy. And blessed is she that believeth, because there shall be a perfection unto those things having been spoken unto her by the Lord.” These inspired utterances of Elizabeth, enunciated in the fullness of the Spirit, should raise the faith of every Christian to the acme of full assurance; as we see, positively and unequivocally, that our faith is the measuring line of our experience. There is no reason why the Elizabethan blessing pronounced on Mary may not be appropriated by every disciple of our Lord. O how appropriate the prayer, “Lord, increase our faith!” 46-56. And Mary said: “My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit doth rejoice in God my Savior: because He hath looked upon the humility of His servant; for, behold, from now, all generations shall call me blessed.” While, of course, we are all to diligently steer clear of the Mariolatry so prominent among the Romanists, yet we must admit that the mother of the Lord, in a most extraordinary sense, is blessed among women, honored far above all others. Well did she predict the encomium pronounced upon her by all generations. This had been the grand aspiration, inspiring millions of Jewish maidens; now she very appropriately realizes this pearl of all blessings within the reach of womanhood: “The Mighty One hath wrought great things; His name is holy; His mercy is to generations of generations of them that fear Him. He hath humiliated the mighty from their thrones, and exalted the humble. He hath filled the poor with good things, and sent away the rich empty. He hath looked upon Israel, His son, to remember mercy, as He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his seed forever.” This brilliant and beautiful prophetical thanksgiving of Mary, under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, vividly contrasts the temporal aggrandizement of the worldly with the spiritual blessings and achievements of the saints, its culminating fulfillment realizable at the second coming of our Lord, when all temporal thrones will fall ( Daniel 7:9); every monarch doff his crown, forfeit his scepter, preparatory to the coronation of Jesus as “King of kings and Lord of lords;” and the promotion of His bridehood to the thrones, dominions, and principalities of all nations.

BIRTH OF JOHN THE BAPTIST 57-66. As Mary abode with Elizabeth at Jutta three months, the time of parturition was at hand. A wonderful time of rejoicing took place at the humble home of Zacharias and Elizabeth when this heir of promise was horn. Pursuant to the Jewish custom of circumcising on the eighth day (a striking symbolism of regeneration — i.e. , the spiritual birth — followed by sanctification, which is spiritual circumcision, in a few days, giving no time for backsliding), they came to administer the rite to the infant. “And they continued to call him Zacharias, by the name of his father.” This was very natural, as both the father and the mother had passed the age of fertility, and this child was supernaturally born, and consequently they could never expect another. We do not wonder that they mutually called him by the name of his father, thus seeking to perpetuate the family cognomen. His mother responding, said: “No; but he shall be called John;” i.e. , the grace of God. We see in all this narrative no discount on the faith of Elizabeth. She has the victory throughout, while her clerical husband has been dumb by reason of doubt. “And they said to her, “There is no one in thy family who is called by this name; and they were beckoning to his father what he might wish to call him. And asking for a writing tablet, he wrote, saying, His name is John; and they were all astonished.” As they had neither ink nor paper, this tablet was a smooth board, covered with oil, on which they wrote with a stile. “And immediately his mouth and tongue were opened, and he continued praising God. And fear came upon all those dwelling around: and all these words were spoken throughout the hillcountry of Judea. And all those hearing, placed them in their hearts, saying, What then shall this child be? And the hand of the Lord was with him.” This whole affair had produced a wonderful sensation, arousing the people on tiptoe of astonishment, as the miraculous and the supernatural are so conspicuous in the whole affair — i.e. , the announcement of the archangel, the heroic faith of Elizabeth, her hermitage in order to communion with God, her wonderful blessing under the ministry of Mary, her mighty preaching and stirring prophecy, the visit of Mary, the wonderful power and spirit with which she witnessed and preached the living Word, the dumbness of Zacharias these nine months, and the flood of sanctifying power poured on him when he confesses the grace of God, — had all conspired to interpenetrate the whole community with electric shocks, and thrill all the people with a burning enthusiasm, holding them spellbound with thrilling anticipation of God’s wonderful visitation to Israel through the instrumentality of this child. 67. “And Zacharias, his father, was filled with the Holy Ghost, and prophesied, saying.” You see here that Zacharias became dumb when he doubted the angel who spoke the word of God. So you — the moment your faith fails, spiritual dumbness will strike you, and your testimony will be minus. You can recognize the spiritual status of the people all around you by their testimonies. All dummies should rally at once to an altar of prayer, and seek the reclaiming grace of God. You see here how faith is made perfect by testimony. The moment Zacharias testifies to the grace of God, his mouth is opened, his tongue loosened, and he is filled with the Holy Ghost, shouting, prophesying, and praising the Lord. So you see that faith and testimony are the two oars by which you row out of doubt and dumbness into the joyous triumphs of entire sanctification. We also here see the superlative importance of speaking as the Oracles of God; i.e. , calling everything by its right name. Zacharias never got the blessing till he called the child John; i.e. , the grace of God. If you want to be filled with the Holy Ghost, and have the victory in your soul and life, call your blessing “sanctification.” So long as your faith flickers, you will never get the victory. Swing clear on the line of consecration, faith, and testimony, and assuredly the victory will not tarry.

ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION THE CENTRAL TRUTH OF THE ABRAHAMIC COVENANT 68-75. “Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, because he hath interposed and wrought redemption for His people, and raised up a horn of salvation to His people in the house of David His son, as He spoke through the mouth of His holy prophets from the beginning, and from the hand of all who hate us, to extend mercy with our father, and remember His holy covenant, which He swore unto Abraham our father: to grant unto us, being delivered out of the hand of our enemies, to serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness, in His presence, all the days of our life.” The Abrahamic covenant is primary in the movement of God’s mercy in behalf of fallen humanity, and fundamental in the redemptive scheme. This follows a logical sequence, from its identity with the covenant which God made with Christ to redeem the world by His expiatory death. ( Galatians 3:16.) Hence the covenant with Abraham was no de novo transaction, but a simple reiteration of the covenant of redemption entered into, in the councils of the Uncreated Three, before sin ever entered into this world; as God, forseeing the catastrophe, provided the remedy. It was pertinent, in order to its recognition and appropriation by the human race, that this covenant should be reiterated with Abraham, or some other suitable representative of the human race. In this peculiar representative sense, Abraham is the father of all the faithful, from the simple fact that there is no salvation outside the redemption covenant, of which he is the representative, participant, human defender, and exponent; i.e. , Abraham is honored by the Almighty as the recipient of the great covenant of human redemption by His Son, and also the paternal representative of this covenant to the whole human race. Therefore, all who have true faith, in all ages and nations, are honored with a place in the Abrahamic paternity. ( Galatians 3:7.) Now if we can ascertain the condition of membership in this covenant, we certainly have found out the sure way of salvation.

Those conditions and promises are clearly and unmistakably specified in the above Scriptures. Pursuant to this covenant, God promises that, “being delivered out of the hands of our enemies [i.e., all spiritual foes, men and devils without, and evil tempers, unholy passions, vicious appetites, and all the debris of the carnal mind within — i.e., being truly sanctified wholly] we shall serve Him in righteousness and holiness all our days.” Whereas sanctification is the work of the Spirit, by which we are made holy, holiness is the state which supervenes in the heart and life as the result of sanctification. Hence, you see that the only stipulation of the Abrahamic covenant, by which the world is to be saved, is, that we get sanctified wholly, and abide in the same throughout probationary life. The prerequisite of admission into heaven is a state of holiness, resulting from the utter eradication of all sin, actual and original, God positively assuring us that we shall never see His face without this gracious attainment. ( Hebrews 12:14.) Hence, we find perfect harmony throughout the Bible, setting forth holiness as the one condition indispensable to admission into heaven. Life in this world is probationary, giving us all time and opportunity to become sanctified, by the blessed and direct office of the Holy Spirit, applying the redeeming blood and washing away all unrighteousness from our spiritual natures, thus rendering our hearts pure and holy. We see here that this is clearly and unequivocally promised in the Abrahamic covenant. Not only the grace of perfect deliverances — i.e. , entire sanctification — but grace to “serve Him, in holiness and righteousness, in His presence, all our days;” i.e. , His wonderful keeping power, by His Word, Spirit, and providence, enabling us to keep this holy covenant amid the temptations of this wicked world, thus illustrating to men, angels, and devils our adaptation to the heavenly state, and congeniality to angels unfallen and spirits redeemed. This we are to do here, “in His presence;” i.e. , God Himself is our Judge, His omniscient eye seeing all of our thoughts, inclinations, and intentions, His infallible ear hearing all the inaudible utterances of our spirit. What a wonderful responsibility is involved in probationary life! Yet the illimitable resources of Omnipotent Grace are abundantly sufficient to qualify all true hearts for these momentous ordeals; and thus fortified by His precious and infallible Word, illuminated and guided by His blessed Holy Spirit, and environed by His merciful providence, like a wall of fire around us by day and by night, there is a blessed possibility that we may live on earth as safe as in heaven. Glory to God for His unspeakable mercies and superabounding grace! 76-79. “And thou shalt be called the prophet of the Highest.” Things in the Divine order are called what they are. John is not only a prophet, but the greatest of all the prophets, and even the honored harbinger of Jesus: “Thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways.” The burden of John’s preaching was repentance, which is fundamental in the plan of salvation. The reason why people are not saved is because they do not receive Jesus; the reason they can not receive Jesus is because they do not repent. John cried constantly, with stentorian Voice, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” The King had the kingdom, into which none could enter unless he came by the only door — i.e. , repentance; in order to give a knowledge of salvation to His people through the remission of their sins, through the bowels of the mercy of our God. The Jews were the people of God — His by election to the progenitorship of Christ. To them, first, experimental salvation was offered. Many of the Gentiles are the elect of grace, foreknown of God. To them, in the second place, salvation was offered. God knows His own, whether Jews or Gentiles, and reveals to them a knowledge of their own salvation through the remission of sins, in which the “day-spring from on high” has looked down upon us.

The wonderful mercy of God in Christ is a day-spring from heaven: “To appear unto those sitting down in darkness and the shadow of death.” The whole world down, easy, careless, and unconcerned, in spiritual darkness, and in the shadow of that dismal night of hopeless, eternal doom, while hell-hounds, bloodthirsty, are on their track, roaring for their prey. “In order to direct our feet in the way of peace:” Instead of sitting down in a careless attitude, we should be up and running for life. The glorious grace of God is here contrasted with the terrible bloody wars raging in the unregenerate heart, and destined to dump us amid the merciless devastations of infuriated devils through all eternity, unless, amid the fleeting opportunities of probationary grace, we may happily exchange the horrific fears of sin and devils for the peace of God in Christ, which is heaven begun in the soul. 80. “The child grew and waxed strong in spirit, and is in the wilderness unto the day of his showing unto Israel.” As a rule, children grow in sin as they increase in physical power. As John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Ghost from his infancy, his spiritual growth and development kept pace with the physical. Jutta, the place of his birth, is not far from the wilderness of Judea. During the slaughter of the infants at Bethlehem, Zacharias and Elizabeth migrated into this wilderness, in order to protect their son from the cruelties of Herod. They return no more to Jutta, but abode in the wilderness the thirty years of John’s minority, and doubtless to the end of their lives; consequently, John enjoyed the signal blessing of an humble, retired home with the poor people of the wilderness. If you have an intimation from the Lord that there is a child of peculiar promise in your home, you should, by all means, get away from the hon tons of society, find a sequested retreat among the poor, where you can bring up your children uncontaminated with the popular and fashionable vices and follies. The Essenes — i.e. , the holiness people of the Jewish Church — who are generally poor, abode in the desert; hence, John was fortunate to enjoy their influence during the thirty years of his childhood and youth.

Thus he studied in God’s theological college — i.e. , the sandy desert where Moses spent forty years preparatory for the leadership of Israel, winding up with the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire, as revealed in the burning bush. Brush College sends out brighter and better graduates than all of the metropolitan universities. (CHAPTER) - AN ANGEL APPEARS TO JOSEPH Matthew 1:18-25. We find that Gabriel spoke to Mary when she was wide awake, in broad daylight; but in the case of Joseph, he appears to him in a dream, while asleep; as Mary, if not vindicated by Divine intervention, must have been culpable under the law of Moses, and liable to the penalty of death by stoning. While Joseph, recognizing her physical condition, and was contemplating a private separation from her, in order to protect her from the severity of the law, the angel notifies him relative to the Conception of Jesus by the Holy Ghost, repeating the prophecy of Isaiah 7:14: “And she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins.”

Here we see that the Messianic glory of Jesus, witnessed by both Testaments, is that “He shall save His people from their sins.” The world is full of religion — Pagan, Moslem, Papal, and Protestant with an infinite diversity of subdivisions; but the great trouble is that they do not take away the sins of their votaries. For this reason, the people who preach and experience entire sanctification really stand alone as the dispensers of the true Gospel, while on them devolves the magnitudinous work of the world’s evangelization. The Bible is its own expositor. If we are not in harmony with it, we are without hope and without God. Full salvation follows as a logical sequence from the Divinity and Consequent omnipotence of our Savior. The world is thronged with millions today who claim to be the followers of Jesus, but do not realize that they are saved from their sins. There is a missing link somewhere in the chain of their profession. If they had Jesus in the true Scriptural sense, they would be saved from all their sins, the Holy Spirit testifying to the fact. The trouble with the world is not about religion, for it inundates the globe, more demonstrative with heathens, Mohammedans, and Jews than Christians; but the problem to be solved is personal, experimental salvation, which, in its intrinsic reality, attested with the Holy Spirit and corroborated by the Word of God, is the only foundation of heavenly hope. When Jesus saves people from their sins, they have them no more. It is an accomplished fact, known and realized beyond the possibility of doubt; has the full assurance, given by the Holy Spirit, to the complete work of Christ in your heart; really precludes all doubt. “And they shall call His name Emmanuel, which is interpreted, God is with us.” Here you see a refutation of the idea entertained by some that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew, and it was subsequently translated into Greek. This inference has doubtless originated from the fact that he wrote it in Judea and for the Jews. But we must remember that the Greek language was universal in the apostolic age, and well known in Jerusalem. The fact that Matthew translates this Hebrew word Emmanuel into Greek, is demonstrative proof that he was writing in Greek. There is a deep and sweet significance in the word Emanuel — i.e. , “God with us” — in contradistinction to his dwelling, far away in heaven, among the angels. The very fact that He took our humanity, to retain it forever, is demonstrative proof that He has become one of us, to abide with us in this world, and all other worlds, through all eternity. Joseph, awakening from his sleep, proceeds at once to do as the angel had told him; i.e. , receive his betrothed wife, and call the name of her Son Jesus, which is a Greek word, and means Savior, signifying the work He came to do — i.e. , to save His people from their sins. Who are His people? All who receive Him; as to them He gives power to become the children of God. ( John 1:12.)

THE BIRTH OF JESUS Luke 2:1-7. “It came to pass in those days [i.e., in the days above mentioned, with reference to John the Baptist and the annunciation of the coming Christ], a decree went forth from Augustus Caesar to enroll all the world.” The battle of Actium, between Augustus Caesar and Mark Antony, gave the former the sole dominion of the known world, his crown radiating the rays of an unsetting sun, and his scepter sweeping the circumference of the globe. “This enrollment first took place, Cyrenius being the governor of Syria, and all went to be enrolled, each one into his own city. And Joseph went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he is of the house and family of David, to be enrolled, along with Mary his wife, being betrothed to him, being in an advanced state of pregnancy.” Nazareth is away up north, in the tribe of Zebulun, while Bethlehem is about one hundred miles south of it, in the tribe of Judah. It so happened that they were not living in their own township. Bethlehem is a compound Hebrew word, and means house of bread; very significant, as it is the nativity of Christ, who is the Bread of life to all the world. I have several times visited Bethlehem, which is this day a beautiful little city of eight thousand, much revived by Jewish capital and industry. The great Church of the Nativity — Greek, Latin, and Armenian each denomination holding daily service at respective hours, contains the manger, hallowed to receive the world’s Redeemer, being wrapped in swaddling-cloths, and laid in a manger, because there was no room for Him in the inn. As His parents were poor, He had no fine clothes, and there was no room for Him in the tavern, where the moneyed people lodged. It is literally true, as a rule, this day, that the Savior is excluded from the houses where the well-to-do people abide. Why was the incarnation of the Savior, the most important event of all ages, postponed four thousand years, while multiplied millions swept into eternity? a. Christ was in the world excarnate — i.e. , out of the place from the beginning and through all the ages preceding His birth at Bethlehem; He was here, and omnipotent to save. Hence there was a gracious possibility in all ages for all to be saved. b. It was necessary that the important event of His incarnation should be postponed beyond the prehistoric ages of myth and fable, lest it be lost in the fogs of ignorance and superstition, and history should not be able to apprehend, appropriate, and transmit it intelligently to all coming ages. c. Such was the incorrigible propensity of fallen humanity to go into creature worship — i.e. , idolatry — that it was necessary to give it the field unobstructed, and opportunity to run its race, do its execution, culminate, and fall into dilapidation, before the great and notable event of our Lord’s incarnation and evangelization to all the nations of the earth.

This was actually done. The Baal idolatry — i.e. , the worship of the sungod, as well as many other forms of idolatry had actually monopolized the world, received the adoration of all nations four thousand years, proved unsatisfactory; ostensibly inadequate to the consolation of the human heart, and the solution of the great problem of humanity: Who am I? whence came I? and what is my destiny? d. Human learning, unsanctified by grace, has in all ages fostered pride and arrayed itself against God.

Hence it was important to give it rope enough to hang itself, and time and opportunity to do it. This was done in the four thousand years postponement. If you will travel through Egypt, Greece, and Rome, you will certify me that the surviving monuments of human art, genius, and learning forces on us the conclusion that in the anti-Christian ages, they actually made greater proficiency and reached loftier achievements that the attainments of any subsequent period; therefore, when infidelity arrays human learning against the Bible, and would extol its superiority as an antidote to the wants of humanity, the argument breaks down, from the simple fact that the arts, sciences, and every ramification of human learning, had the world four thousand years, unobstructed by the revealed Word, meanwhile making the loftiest attainments possible, and still signally failing to satisfy the longings of the immortal soul, condole the griefs of a broken heart, and deliver humanity from guilt and sin, and solve the great problem of experimental salvation. e. When the postdiluvians, under the leadership of Nimrod, resolved to build a tower so high that another flood could never pass over it, God arrested their impious enterprise by confounding their language, and thus filling the world with innumerable dialects.

In order to the universal propagation of the gospel, it was important to girdle the globe with one common language, spoken by all the nations of the earth. This was done by the universal conquest of Alexander the Great, placing the Greeks, with their beautiful, vivacious, and comprehensive language, in the leadership of every nation under heaven, thus enveloping the globe with one common language. f. As the world was occupied by an infinite variety of different nations, so that an army could scarcely pass out of the shadow of its own capital without invading the territory of its neighbor, and all these arrayed against each other in deadly conflict — amid this state of infinite and antagonistical political divisions, it would have been impossible to verify the Commission, “Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” A great, universal military Government was an indispensable prerequisite to the world’s evangelization. This actually obtained in the universal conquests of Rome, throwing the Briarean arms of a powerful military despotism around all the nations of the earth. Under this universal military Government, the apostles were permitted to go to the ends of the earth — Matthew to Ethiopia and Central Africa; Mark to Egypt and Northern Africa; Peter to Rome; Paul to Eastern Asia and Western Europe; the two Jameses to Jerusalem and Palestine; Andrew to Armenia; Philip to Syria; Bartholomew to Phrygia; Jude to Tartary; Thomas to India; and Simon Zelotes to the British Islands, their comrades actually dispersing to the ends of the earth. If all these countries had not been under the one great military Government of Rome, it would have been impossible for them to carry out the Commission in the peregrination of the globe; for as soon as they passed into another nation, they would have been arrested, imprisoned, and probably put to death. Now that all of these important and indispensable events. have transpired, Pagan polytheism has run its race without a competitor, and is on the universal decline. Human learning, with the world for its dominion, has gone to the acme, and signally failed to solve the grand problem of human life and destiny. The Alexandrian conquest has put the Greek language, the finest the world ever saw, in every nation, actually making it the shibboleth of the globe; while the Romans have triumphed on all the battle-fields of earth, enveloping all nations in the mystical network of an invincible universal despotism, thus obliterating the incorrigible obstructions of national boundaries, unifying the world, and turning it over to the heralds of gospel grace. g. Besides the removal of the above difficulties, and the opening of all nations to the ingress of the gospel, there has already sprung up a universal anticipation, not simply among Jews, blessed with the light of prophecy, but all the Gentile world have, in some way, received the impression and reached the conclusion that a Divine messenger is about to come into the world — really, all nations are on tiptoe with anticipation of the coming Messiah. Hark! a glad voice the lonely desert cheers:

Prepare the way! a God, a God appears!

Lo! earth receives Him from the bending skies; Sink down, ye mountains; ye valleys, rise; With heads declined, ye cedars, homage pay; Be smooth, ye rocks; ye rapid floods, give way; The Savior comes, by ancient bards foretold; Hear him, ye deaf; and all ye blind, behold!” The advent of Christ is the greatest event that has ever transpired upon the earth, actually inundating the globe with the grace of God, and bringing salvation within the reach of every fallen son and daughter of Adam’s lost race. While His first advent floods the world with grace, the second will inundate the world with glory; thus His two advents constituting the great salient epochs of the world’s history — the one, the ineffable transition out of legal bondage into the triumphs of free grace; and the other, sweeping on from grace to glory. As the Incarnate Christ is the very impersonation of redeeming grace, inexhaustible and omnipotent, poured out on every human being without money and without price, so when the Lord comes again, He will be the incarnation of glory, bringing His glory with Him, and freely transmitting it to all His saints. I do not see that His glorious coming will do away, or even supersede His omnipotent grace; but it will be an accession to it, both grace and glory surviving, accumulating, and augmenting through all eternity.

THE SHEPHERDS 8-20. “The shepherds were at that time tenting out, and keeping watch over their flock through the night.” This fact refutes the popular idea of the birth of our Savior taking place in midwinter, thus locating Christmas, December 25th. In the summer time, sheep lie in the shade through the heat of the day, and graze at night; whereas during the winter, they sleep in the night and graze in daytime. If it had been midwinter, the shepherds would not have been out with their flocks at night, but in houses, caves, or kraals. The critics have settled on April 5th as the Christmas. I doubt not but they are correct. “Behold the angel of the Lord stood over them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them; and they were affrighted with a great fear.” The shepherds’ field, where these notable events took place, is in full view of Bethlehem, perhaps a couple of miles east. The angel said to them: “Fear not; for, behold, I proclaim to you good tidings of great’ joy, which shall be to all the people: for this day a Savior is born unto you, who is Christ the Lord, in the city of David.” Bethlehem was generally known as the city of David as it was the home of Boaz, Obed, Jesse, and David. “And this shall be the sign to you: you shall find an infant, wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.” The English uses the article, and reads, “The babe,” which is incorrect; the article is not in the Greek, whereas it destroys the meaning. A babe lying in a manger, wrapped in swaddling cloths, was really the sign designated by the angel. It was a sure sign, good enough; as you might travel round the world and not find it. “And immediately there was a multitude of the heavenly host along with the angel, praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, and good will among men.” When the lonely angel had revealed the news to the shepherds, his testimony was corroborated by a multitude, praising God, and shouting the beautiful doxology, “Glory to God in the highest.” All the glory of human salvation belongs to God, as it is utterly impossible for any of us ever to bring Him under the slightest obligation to show us mercy. Christ, by His own atonement, made peace on earth with every human being, not only appertaining to God, but one another. There was no reason why peace with God and every human being should not cover the whole earth, and flood every soul with the heavenly prelibation.

The wonderful work of Christ actually has brought good will to every soul and every home, not only toward all the world, but toward God. No reason why the whole earth should not be filled with the glory of God, since Christ has swept every difficulty away. “And it came to pass, when the angels departed from them to heaven, and the men [i.e., the shepherds] said to one another, Let us go even unto Bethlehem, and let us see this thing which has taken place, which the Lord has made known unto us. And they, hastening, came and found both Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger.” See the contrast between verse twelve, where infant and manger both occur without the article, as the shepherds knew nothing about the circumstances, and the event and finding an infant wrapped in swaddling cloths lying in a manger, was to be the sign to them that the angel’s testimony was true. Now having come, they find an infant lying in a manger, wrapped in swaddling cloths, as the angel had said, thus literally verifying the angel’s testimony. Now in verse sixteen the Greek article occurs both with infant and manger, because the sign of the angel being verified, they know now that they have found the identical infant, precluding all possibility of mistake. “And seeing they knew with certainty concerning the word which was spoken unto them” about this little child; i.e. , the sign given by the angel being now literally verified, assures the shepherds beyond all doubt as to the identity of the babe. “And all those hearing were astonished concerning those things which were spoken to them by the shepherds.” See how God honored these shepherds above all the aristocrats, princes, and potentates of the earth by really making them the first witnesses to His Incarnate Son, and the first heralds of the best, greatest, and most wonderful tidings that ever rang in mortal ears. In all ages, the people who herd the flocks day and night have, as a rule, been poor, humble, and ignorant. 19. “Mary kept all these words, laying them up in her heart.” She saw how the testimony of the shepherds corroborated the annunciation of Gabriel at her humble home in Nazareth nine months preceding. The meaning of heart is spiritual rather than mental. Mary, under the illuminations of the Holy Spirit, kept rigid spiritual cognizance of everything appertaining to her child. “And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things which they heard and saw, as was spoken to them.” There is no doubt but these shepherds were not only godly men, like Simeon and Anna looking for the Messiah, but that they enjoyed an extraordinary depth of spiritual illumination, and were thus prepared for the exalted honor conferred. We see they had the grace of humility too copious to imbibe spiritual pride, even over this exalted encomium, as they return betimes to their waiting flocks. As they have no fences in that country, all stock are herded, and there is this day much of it there.

CIRCUMCISION OF JESUS & HIS PRESENTATION IN THE TEMPLE 21-24. “And when the eight days for circumcising Him were fulfilled, and He was called Jesus, being called by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.” Gabriel brought His name down from heaven, designative of His office and character, which is to save all the people from their sins who will let Him. “And when the days of their purification were fulfilled, according to the law of Moses, they brought Him to Jerusalem; as has been written in the law of the Lord, That every male opening the matrix shall be called holy to the Lord; and to offer sacrifice according to that which has been spoken in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” The Scriptures setting forth the law of the Lord appertaining to the purification of the mother and the presentation of the child to the Lord are found in Leviticus 12, Exodus 13, and Numbers 8. Thus we see that, as Mary and Joseph were godly people, every ramification of the law was to be rigidly fulfilled, even in case of Him who made the law. Though the circumcision means sanctification by the elimination of the old man of sin, and Jesus had no sin, yet as it behooved Him to fulfill all righteousness, He received circumcision like the sinful men whom He came to save. The purification which the law required of His mother, after thirty days, was to be accompanied by the offering of a lamb; but in case of the poor, they might bring the cheaper offering — a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons. Hence, the parents of Jesus being poor, they offered the cheap sacrifice. We see in everything, that our Lord, His family, prophets, apostles, and friends, rank among the lowly. Still the people all want to get up. Jesus is our Paragon. We ought to want to live and die as He did.

SIMEON & ANNA Whereas it was the glorious privilege of all Israel to receive Christ and proclaim Him to the world — an honor above the angels — yet we see but very few; e.g., the shepherds of the field, Zacharias and Elizabeth, Joseph and Mary, Simeon and Anna, the apostles and sainted contemporaries of our Lord, constituting but a handful of the great Jewish nation, were all who enjoyed this exalted honor, the rest being blinded. Whereas it is certainly the glorious privilege of the whole Christian Church to enjoy the transcendent honor and blessing of receiving Jesus at His second coming, descending from the skies, and witnessing to His glory, yet it is highly probable that the proportion of the elect who shall enjoy this privilege will not be greater than at His first advent. “And, behold, there was a man in Jerusalem to whom was the name Simeon: the same man righteous and godly, awaiting the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.” Simeon was gloriously sanctified, filled with the Holy Ghost, and on the constant outlook for the appearing of his Lord. If we are not in a similar attitude, we will certainly be without excuse, as we live in a much brighter dispensation than he. “And it had been revealed unto him by the Holy Spirit that he should not see death before that he may see the Christ of the Lord.” O what a wonderful Pentecostal experience Simeon enjoyed, and how should his testimony put to the blush the halting Christians of the present day!

Simeon was living in advance of his dispensation — i.e. , up in ours; whereas so many in our day are back in the dispensation of Moses. Here we see that Simeon was not only filled with the Spirit, but led by Him, as we all ought to be. And he came in the Spirit into the temple. The critics tell us that none but the priests were admitted into the temple proper, and when we read so frequently about the temple in the biography of our Savior, it means other buildings connected with it, which were many and capacious, on the Temple Campus. “And while the parents brought in the little child Jesus, that they may do according to that which is required of the law concerning Him; and he received Him into his arms, and blessed God, and said, And now permit Thy servant, O Lord, to depart in peace, according to Thy Word; because mine eyes have seen Thy Salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all Thy people: a light unto the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel.” Thus far, Israel had been the custodian of the Divine Oracles and the dispensers of truth. Now the time has come for them to propagate this heavenly benediction to all the nations of the earth, themselves being the recipients of this unearthly glory; meanwhile the Gentiles, wrapped in heathen darkness four thousand years, are to receive this “day-spring from on high,” a glorious sunburst from the throne of God, chasing away the dismal night of sin, and revealing the ineffable glory of salvation, rich, sweet, full, and free, to the old, the young, the great, the small, the rich, the poor, the wise and the unwise. “Joseph and His mother were wondering over the things spoken by him.

Simeon blest them, and said to Mary His mother, Behold, He is appointed for the fall and the rising of many in Israel, and a sign that shall be spoken against.” O how signally and sadly was Simeon’s prophecy verified! The rank and the of the great Jewish Church, both ministry and membership, rejected Him and fell; while not a few received Him, leaping into life. And O the contradiction which clamored against Him from Dan to Beersheba!

How Jerusalem roared with the ejaculation, “Crucify Him!” “And a sword shall go through thy soul.” How was this fulfilled in the case of Mary? She, like his other faithful disciples, failing to apprehend the prophecies relative to His crucifixion, believing that He was the Christ and invulnerable, expected Him to live forever. O how the sword darted through her soul when she saw her beloved Son, whom she had expected to redeem Israel, demonically murdered! Again, she was but a fallen being, like others, needing personal salvation, which she could only receive by the Sword of the Spirit. e., the Word of God — going through her soul, thus destroying all the virus of original sin. “In order that the thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.” It was absolutely necessary that Christ should come, suffer, and die, to satisfy the penalty of the violated law, in order that the Holy Spirit, the Illuminator, Electrifier, and Sanctifier of the human soul be given. Hence, you see the Holy Ghost, the Revelator of all human thoughts through the words of Christ, is given to all the world, revealing the deep things of the heart, to our unutterable astonishment, simultaneously revealing the glorious remedy, the open, flowing fountain of the Savior’s precious blood, and inspiring the consecration and faith requisite to plunge beneath the cleansing wave, and “Rise, to walk in heaven’s own light, Above the world and sin, With heart made pure and garments white, And Jesus crowned within.” 36-38. We see here that Anna was a preacher too — i.e. , a prophetess — identical with the called and sent preachers of the gospel dispensation. She was eighty-four years old; having married at maturity, and been left a widow in seven years, she devoted her life to the ministry of the Word, abiding in the temple day and night. So you see she was no backwoods preacher, but a metropolitan, enjoying a settled pastorate at Jerusalem. Her grand theme was Jesus and the expectation of His immediate appearing.

So, at the present day, the glorious theme of every true gospel preacher is Jesus and the constant watch for His appearing. The glorious dispensation of entire sanctification, in which we are permitted to live, involves the gospel message of entire sanctification, the fullness of experience, and the Constant expectancy of the Lord’s appearing. (CHAPTER) - THE ORIENTAL MAGI Matthew 2:1-12. “Jesus having been born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, the magi came from the East, saying, Where is He who was born King of the Jews? for we have seen His star in the East, and have come to worship Him.” These magi, or wise men, were the priests, diviners, and astrologers of Persia, Media, Babylonia, and Arabia. From what Country they came, we know not, as they were scattered all over the great East. Astrology is the science by which future events are predicted from the motions and phenomena of the stars. God availed himself of the profession of these influential men to give publicity to the advent of His Son. The Arabs and Babylonians were the most proficient astronomers of the early ages, always identifying it, more or less, with mythology and enchantment. Hence, these magi were accustomed to spend whole nights gazing skywardly, and diagnosing the movements and the relative brilliancy, as well as other phenomena, of the stars. Behold, in the Oriental firmament, a new star is seen, identified with none of the constellations with which those professional stargazers are so familiar. Behold, this star turns meteor, and shoots far away into the Western heavens. As the whole world is on the outlook for the Messianic advent, and these magi, standing at the front of the religious movements in the East, receive a Divine intimation that this star is ominous of that glorious coming King, from time immemorial expected by the Jews, consequently they immediately set out, and follow this moving star till they reach the land of Judea; proceeding at once to Jerusalem, the center of population, government, and influence, supposing that they can there get information in reference to the birth of the Mighty One adumbrated by the new star, which they have followed from their Eastern home. “Herod, the king, hearing, was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.” As Herod’s father was an Idumean, and his mother an Arab, he doubtless feared the influence of a native king, lest he supersede him. Whereas, Herod’s long reign of thirty-eight years had been characterized by cruelty and blood, as he never stopped till he had actually hunted up and massacred all the Maccabean family, not even sparing his own wife, Mary Anne, nor his sons, Alexander and Aristobulus; doubtless the Jerusalemites dreaded the bloody revolution that would arise in an attempt to supersede him in the kingdom. “Assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquires of them where Christ is to be born, and they said unto him, In Bethlehem of Judea; for thus it has been written by the prophet [Micah 5:2], And thou, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art not least among the princes of Judah; for out of thee shall come a Governor, who shall shepherd My people Israel.” How strange, when these chief priests and scribes were so well posted in the Messianic prophecies as tip on the first inquiry correctly to locate the birth of Christ, and then, when the test came, reject Him as an impostor! “Then Herod, secretly calling the magi, inquired from them the time of the appearing of the star, and, sending them to Bethlehem, said, “Go and search diligently for the young Child, and when you find Him, report to me, in order that having gone, I may worship Him also.” King Herod was a very bold and prominent professor of the Jewish religion, having rebuilt the temple with great magnificence, and done many things to promote the interest of the Jewish Church; now, in the attitude of a devout Jew, watching and waiting for the Christ of prophecy to make His appearance, he treats the magi with appreciative courtesy, requesting them to go on to Bethlehem and find out whether Christ has there been born, as revealed by the star, and in that case, by all means, give him word without delay, that he may go and enjoy the privilege of worshipping Him; while at the same time he had deliberately made up his mind to slay the very Infant pointed out by the magi. How wonderfully history repeats itself! The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of Christ. The true holiness movement is the manifestation of the Holy Ghost, as the human body of Jesus is the manifestation of Christ. Nothing is more common in the present age than for people claiming conservatism to holiness, and even identity with the movement, to be its bitterest enemies, and only watching an opportunity to exterminate it. Herod stood at the head of the visible Church, claiming to be a true worshiper of Jesus, and at the same time seeking to kill Him. So the Church this day abounds in Herods, claiming to be the votaries of holiness, and seeking to destroy it. “And hearing the king, they departed, and, behold, the star which they saw in the East led them in advance, until having come, it stood over the place where the young child was. Seeing the star, they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy.” On the road from Jerusalem to Bethlehem there is a well, about a mile from the city, called the Well of the Star, because they say that when the wise men reached it, and looked in, they saw and recognized the star which had appeared to them in the East and led them on their way.

Then the star evaded their gaze no more, but led them on till it paused over the cradle containing the world’s Redeemer. The conclusion from the facts revealed seems legitimate, that when the magi turned away from the direct route to Bethlehem to go to Jerusalem, the great metropolis, and consult the mighty men, the star eluded their vision, appearing to them no more till they get back on the direct road to Bethlehem, then reappearing, and leading them to the identical One for whose sake they had taken their long journey. So the Divine leadership is a bright star of present security and heavenly hope. It will never forsake us while we keep in God’s order, treading steadfastly the narrow way of holiness. But when we take our destiny into our own hand, and turn away into big places to consult great men, and do things with a big auger, we are sure to get out of kelter.

Bethlehem was a little, obscure village. If they had followed the star, paying no attention to the big city and the great men, they would have found the Savior quickly, and had no trouble with King Herod. So, if you want to find Jesus quickly and satisfactorily, follow the Holy Star (i.e. , the Holy Spirit), giving little or no attention to big preachers and influential Churches. “Having come into the house, they saw the little child, with Mary His mother, and falling down, they worshipped Him, and opening their treasures, they offered Him gifts, gold, frankincense, and myrrh.” When I was at Bethlehem, the guide showed me a church edifice, about five hundred yards from the Church of the Nativity, which contains the manger in which Jesus was born, and said that this church stands on the spot originally occupied by the house in which Mary and Joseph lived with the infant Jesus, perhaps a month after He was born. This corroborates the statement here, that the wise men came into the house, not the manger. Of course, they either traveled on foot, or on camels or donkeys, occupying considerable time in their journey. No mention here is made of Joseph, as he happened to be absent at the time of their arrival. How wonderfully God provides for coming emergencies before we have the slightest inkling of their approach! Do you not see how very opportune these valuable gifts came to Joseph, just at the time he needed money to defray their expenses to Egypt, though he had not yet dreamed of going. The frankincense and myrrh were exceedingly valuable Oriental aromatics, which they could sell for money, and with the gold brought by the magi, have a splendid outfit for the great and expensive journey which lay immediately before them, though they apprehended it not. “Being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed by another way into their own country.” Daniel says “the dream is from the Lord.” The Bible abounds in dreams, revealing Divine truths of greatest importance to humanity. Hence we must not depreciate dreams, but open our understanding and invite God to speak to us, ad hbitum, in our dreams or our waking. Doubtless cruel Herod would have imprisoned, and perhaps killed, the magi if he could have gotten his hands on them. God defeated him, and protected them by a dream. So, lookout! God, in His own way, will take care of you.

SOJOURN IN EGYPT 13-15. Now Joseph, a true, godly man, dreams. God talks to him in the stilly hours of his nightly slumber. It is a long way for Mary to ride a donkey, and carry the Babe in her lap. Fortunately, He is now a month old. Then there was a complete overland route from Canaan to Egypt through the Isthmus of Suez, which, a few years ago, has been cut through by a canal, one hundred miles long, one hundred yards wide, and thirty feet deep, at the cost of one hundred millions of dollars. I have several times crossed the track of Joseph and Mary, with Jesus, into Egypt. I was in the house now a Coptic church — in Old Cairo, where they say the holy family spent the time in Egypt; also, under the great sycamore-tree, twenty miles from that house, where tradition says they tarried and rested.

Hosea foresaw this event long centuries before it occurred, and wrote, “Out of Egypt have I called My Son.”

SLAUGHTER OF THE INFANTS 16-18. Herod’s cruelty was simply horrific, killing his wife and three sons — Antipater, only five days before he died; all the Maccabean family; and all others who were even suspected of political rivalry. So now he sends forth and deluges Bethlehem with the blood of the innocent infants, taking all, indiscriminately, two years old and younger, so as to make sure that he got the right one, as he was determined at any cost to hold fast the royal scepter. See how wonderfully God defeats the devil in the interest of his true people! While Herod was ransacking all Bethlehem, and cutting the throat of every infant, so as to make sure that he got Jesus, He was perfectly safe in His mother’s arms, far away in another continent, so that Herod had all of his slaughter for nothing. Jeremiah 31:15, with prophetic ear, long centuries antecedent to it, hears the awful weeping in Bethlehem: “A voice was heard in Rama, lamentation, weeping, and great mourning: Rachel weeping for her children, and was not willing to be comforted, because they are not.” Rama is the name of the country in and about Bethlehem. Rachel’s Tomb is in full view of Bethlehem, and only a mile distant. Here, long centuries after she is dead, she is described as weeping over her children, and refusing to be comforted, because they are dead. The simple solution of the matter is, that Jeremiah, who was a brilliant poet, here turns loose his poetic imagination, personifying the weeping mothers of Bethlehem, whose dear babes were thus slaughtered, by Rachel, a mother in Israel, whose body is there with them sleeping in the dust. It is a strong figure, representing this dear mother, who had been so long dead, as now waking and weeping over her slaughtered children.

THE HOLY FAMILY RETURN FROM EGYPT 19-23, & Luke 2:39,40. “And Herod having died.” We do not know how long they remained in Egypt, but evidently the period was brief.

Scarcely has the wail of the slaughtered infants died away on the air of Bethlehem till the cruel old king, becoming quite ill, goes to Jericho, where he had a palace and a pool, that he may avail himself of the sanitary warm baths for the recovery of his health. Even there he slays Antipater, his only surviving son by his first wife, Mary Anne, whom he had slain, with her other two sons, Alexander and Aristobulus; this dark crime only preceding five days his own exit to meet God and enter upon the awful retributions of eternity. “Behold, an angel of the Lord appears to Joseph in a dream in Egypt: Arise, take the young child and His mother, and go into Israel, for those seeking the life of the young child are dead. And he, rising, took the young child and His mother, and came into Israel. And hearing that Archelaus rules over Judea in the room of Herod his father, he feared to go thither.” Archelaus, being the only surviving son of Herod, received the government nominally by inheritance. We must remember that after the battle of Actium, which left Augustus Caesar sole proprietor of the Roman Empire, which had conquered the whole world, consequently no king in any country could reign till he went to Rome and received his crown at the hand of the emperor; consequently, immediately after the death of Herod, Archelaus went away to Rome, a long and perilous journey for those times, in order that the emperor might crown him king of the Jews. Now it is a simple fact that the emperor positively refused to crown him, so that Archelaus was really never king of Judea. On the contrary, the emperor sent Coponius to Judea, in the capacity of proconsul, thus dismantling the kingdom, and turning it into a Roman province, no longer having its own king, but simply a governor, sent out by the Roman emperor, to rule that country as a Roman province. Now why did this transition take place at this peculiar time? Why, it was a fulfillment of prophecy, which says, “The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, till Shiloh [i.e., Christ] comes.” Now do you not see this wonderful fulfillment of prophecy?

Augustus Caesar had crowned Herod king of the Jews, and why not now crown Archelaus, and let the Jews have their kingdom, instead of reducing them to a state of vassalage by taking away their kingdom, and making them a Roman province? The solution is plain. Shiloh had already come, and the scepter had departed from Judah. Though the Roman emperor knew nothing about these prophecies nor their fulfillment, yet arbitrarily taking the bit in his teeth, he proceeded, undeviatingly, literally to fulfill the prophecies. So are wicked worldly people this day fulfilling the prophecies with astounding accuracy. “Being warned in a dream, he departed into the regions of Galilee.

Having come, he dwelt in a city called Nazareth; in order that the word spoken by the prophets may be fulfilled, that He shall be called a Nazarene.” ( Isaiah 11:1.)

The village of Nazareth was so obscure and insignificant as never so much as to receive a mention in all the Old Testament Scriptures. It was proverbial for ignorance and poverty, so that the maxim obtained, “No good can come out of Nazareth;” thus illustrating the universally patent fact that this world is upside down, human estimation all wrong, and the very opposite of the Divine and true. Though Nazareth in human estimation was the most worthless place on the earth, it has come to the front, more celebrated and honored than all the time-honored metropolises on the globe. The same is true of the people. Examine all history. Those who have risen to true eminence have emanated from utter obscurity; while the high-born, as a rule, dwindle into insignificance, never amounting to anything. I did so much enjoy my sojourn in Nazareth, happily reached by Jewish and Christian enterprise, now quite flourishing, with a population of seven thousand. How I did enjoy walking through the house where Jesus dwelt thirty years; visiting Joseph’s carpenter-shop, where He labored with him at the work-bench; and the old synagogue, where He actually worshipped the God of Israel thirty years! The primitive Christians were called “Nazarenes.” “And the little child grew and became strong in spirit, being filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him.” (Luke 2:40.) No wonder the body of Jesus grew and symmetrically developed with rolling years, as He had no physical infirmities, superinduced by the fall.

Consequently He never had any sickness to impede His growth, His physical life throughout being like that of Adam before the fall, perfectly healthy, natural, and free from all ailments of any kind. This conclusion follows as a legitimate sequence from the very fact that He took our nature, without sin and its consequence; i.e. , without infirmity. His spiritual development was truly marvelous, from the simple fact that His intellect was perfectly clear and cloudless, never muddled, nor confused, nor in any way thrown off its equilibrium. His affections were perfectly pure, and never contaminated by anything vile. His memory was perfect, so that He never forgot anything, while His judgment was infallible, even while in childhood. Hence He was actually filled with the true wisdom of God peculiar to the heavenly state; while the grace of God, not only filled, but crowned Him.

JESUS TWELVE YEARS OLD This inspired omission of our Lord’s biography the first thirty years of His life, with the single exception of His visit to Jerusalem when twelve years old, has been a puzzle to thousands. It is certainly very plausible, as we are not interested in that period of His life in any essential or saving sense, from the fact that, pursuant to the Mosaic law, He patiently waited the arrival of Jewish majority before He entered upon His official Messiahship. If this had been written, it would make the New Testament too voluminous for the mind to grasp and the memory to retain. Hence the omission of non-essentials is a great blessing. So we proceed now to investigate the only item in His history during the first thirty years intervening between His birth and His baptism. Luke 2:41-52. We have here the statement that when they journeyed from Nazareth to Jerusalem, one hundred miles, on foot, in order to attend the great annual Passover, when Jesus was twelve years old, having spent the time (eight days; i.e. , beginning on the Sabbath, running through the week, and dosing on the Sabbath), and with their company — band of relatives and friends traveling together for mutual security and companionship — and stopping at nightfall, they first miss the Child, as so many are going along together, they at first suppose that He is with some of the relatives and friends. (I passed by the village of Beeroth, twelve miles north of Jerusalem, where it is certified that the parents first missed the Child.) Getting ready, and starting perhaps about noon, and traveling on foot leisurely, on account of the women and children, they would journey about a dozen miles by the time to stop and fix up for the night encampment, as was their custom, and is yet, in that warm country.

When they miss Him, search thoroughly, and settle the matter that He is not in the crowd, they return to Jerusalem. After three days spent ransacking the city, they find Him, sitting in one of the temple buildings, of which there were very many on the Holy Campus, “in the midst of the teachers, hearing them and asking them questions. All hearing Him were astonished at His understanding and His answers. And seeing Him, they were overwhelmed with surprise and delight, and His mother said to Him, Child, why did you do so to us? Behold, both Thy father and I continued to seek You sorrowing. And He said to them, Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that it behooveth Me to be in the affairs of My Father?” In the Jewish economy, a priest was said to become the son of the law at the age of twelve, being then old enough to understand the commandments and keep them. So here, Jesus seems to accept that situation in the attitude of a faithful Priest in His dispensation. Hitherto in the home, lovingly obedient to His earthly father and mother, we do not know that He had given them any direct information relative to His Divinity and His Messiahship. Now we see that He puts all scruple and inquiry on their part to a quietus by a positive announcement of His Divine Sonship, and His mission on earth, not to do the will of earthly parents (which of course He did, subserviently to the law), but to execute the will and purpose of His Heavenly Father, who had sent Him into the world to perform the stupendous work of redemption. “They understood not the word which He spoke to them. And He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them. And His mother kept all these things in her heart.” Of course, from the first announcement of the archangel Gabriel, Mary had diligently and enthusiastically remembered everything which seemed to shadow forth the Divinity of her child. Yet doubtless His daily presence with them, thus becoming so familiar and common, as an incessant inmate of the home, they did not apprehend and realize the Divine majesty which so far was hidden in the humanity. “Jesus increased in wisdom, stature, and favor with God and men.” During the thirty years of His minority, before His reception of the Holy Ghost, immediately after His baptism, His beautiful, amiable, and irreproachable life, brightened with all the loving graces of an innocent and holy disposition, overflowing with kindness and love to everybody as a normal consequence, popular favor and kindly estimation and appreciation turned on Him from all the people. Doubtless all were delighted with Him as an active and prominent member of the synagogue. But you see, so soon as He returned home from the baptism of John and the induement of the Holy Ghost, they all fell out with Him and tried to kill Him. Hitherto He has been an irreproachable member of the Church; now, He is a firebaptized, Spirit-filled Preacher of the gospel. Therefore His words hew Adam the First all to pieces; then He well says, “The world hateth Me.” So His favor with men evanesced.

GENEALOGIES Matthew 1 and Luke 3. There is but one fact of vital importance in all of these genealogies, and that is the transmission to all generations, an infallible history of our Lord’s progenitorship, setting forth, beyond controversy, the fact of His human descension from Adam. In order to reach man in the plan of salvation, He must be a Man; in order to save men, He must be God. While His miracles and fulfillment of the prophecies prove His Divinity, the inspired genealogies prove His humanity. That the testimony shall be indubitable, it is given by two of our Lord’s inspired biographers, which can not be a copy either of the other, because of their dissimilitude, running in opposite directions. (CHAPTER) - MINISTRY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST BY MATTHEW, MARK, AND LUKE Luke 3:1-2. “In the fifteenth year of the dominion of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod tetrarch of Galilee, and Philip his brother tetrarch of Iturea and the Trachonitis country, and Lysanias being tetrarch of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness.” Luke gives us important specifications, stating that Tiberius was emperor of the Roman world; Pontius Pilate, governor of Judea; Herod — i.e. , Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great, who was on the throne of Judea when our Savior was born, and slew the infants — was tetrarch of Galilee. His jurisdiction also included Perea, east of the Jordan.

As both of these countries were traversed by our Savior, it is important that they appear in this introductory. The Philip here mentioned, the brother of Herod, and governor of Iturea and Trachonitis, was not the one whose wife, Herodias, Herod Antipas took; but she was the wife of another Philip, who was a half brother to Herod. Abilene, the tetrarchy of Lysanias, was a region of country in Anti-Lebanon, between Damascus and Heliopolis. We have Annas and Caiaphas here, both spoken of as high priests; and we see, in our Lord’s arraignment, He was brought before each one of them. The solution of the matter seems to be that the Roman authorities favored the high-priesthood of Annas, and the Jewish that of Caiaphas. After Zacharias and Elizabeth fled away from Jutta, near Bethlehem, into the wilderness of Judea, to protect their child from the cruelties of Herod, they returned no more during the minority of John.

Consequently, upon reaching the age of thirty, he entered at once upon his ministry there in the desert ( Matthew 3:1,2), “preaching in the desert of Judea, and saying, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Mark 1:4, “John came baptizing in the desert, and preaching the baptism of repentance unto the remission of sins.” I here use the word “desert,” in lieu of “wilderness,” because the latter is utterly illusory to the American reader. By wilderness, in this country, we understand a wild region of Country, overgrown with briers, brambles, and brush, as well as forest trees. That is not the Bible meaning of the word eremos , which means a region of country either destitute of water, because the rains do not fall on it, or at least partially destitute, because of insufficiency of rains. Four times have I traveled through the wilderness of Judea, where John the Baptist was brought up and did his first preaching. It is a desert, dry and unproductive, seldom seeing a green leaf, because of insufficient rains. Mosses, ferns, and nettles grow there, fed on by the goats, donkeys, and camels. In the deserts there are oases, like islands in the ocean, where springs of water so irrigate as to produce some sustenance for man and beast, and these are the places of habitation. John was brought up in that poor, wild, sterile desert of Judea, lying between Jerusalem and Bethlehem on the west, and the Dead Sea on the east.

Here we see that the burden of John’s Gospel is repentance unto the remission of sins. When man truly repents, God always forgives. John cried, with stentorian voice, “Repent, because the kingdom of heaven is at hand;” i.e. , Christ the King is at hand, who, of course, brings the kingdom with Him. Matthew 3; Mark 1:3; Luke 3:4. “The voice of one roaring in the desert, Prepare ye the way of the Lord: make His paths straight.” “Crying,” E.V. is “boontos,” from “boo,” the noise an ox makes when he lows. Hence it means roaring like an ox. We see from these facts that John had a stalwart, robust constitution, having been brought up in the rough and tumble life of the desert, and now, thirty years old — i.e. , a grown young man — in his vigor, filled and flooded with the Holy Ghost, he throws his great mouth wide open, and roars, like an ox bawling.

His message was simple and brief. He had but one theme, and that was repentance unto the remission of their sins, confirming their covenant by water baptism. His stentorian voice, and the burning truth, which leaped like forked lightnings from his lips, stir the people terrifically, as he assures them that the King of heaven is already on the earth, and the most important enterprise of life is to prepare to meet Him, which they can only do by repenting of all their sins, unto a conscious experimental remission, which he proposed to confirm by water baptism. A true repentance is accompanied by restitution, which undoes all the bad work of the former life, making all wrongs right so far as possible, God taking the will for the deed in case of impossibility. If you would get saved, the Lord must come into your heart. He will not travel over a crooked road.

Hence you must make his paths straight — i.e. , make straight ways for the Lord to come into thy heart; i.e. , you must straighten out all of your own crooked ways — otherwise the Lord will never come into your heart, and you would better never have been born. John gave the trumpet no uncertain sound. He had both the thunder and the lightning — the former, to call attention and terrify; and the latter, to kill. O how the Lord needs such preachers now, to arouse a slumbering world and a dead Church from the lethargy of swift damnation! Luke 5,6. “Every valley shall be filled up, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low.” True repentance brings the king, the queen, the nobleman, the great man, the hon tons of society, down low in the dust at the feet of Jesus, where they can get religion, and be humble enough to black their own shoes, cook, and wash dishes, delighted to wait on themselves and their friends, and live the life of the meek and lowly; while the wonderful redeeming grace of God lifts up beggars, drunkards, and harlots, and transforms the very “filth and offscourmg of the world” into mighty men and saintly women, whose seraphic voices hold multitudes spellbound, and whose mighty works will glorify God in the day of eternity. “Crooked things shall be straight, and rough places shall become the smooth Ways, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” These wonderful transformations of redeeming grace and sanctifying power, transforming the roughest reprobates into the most amiable saints, and the most stupid simpletons into fire-baptized witnesses for Jesus, the blackest debauchees into bloodwashed pilgrims for glory bound, tells the wonderful secret of the world’s evangelization. There is no other way to bring about this summum desideratum, for which every true heart sighs night and day.

Hence it devolves on the holiness people of all lands to verify the Commission, and “preach the gospel to every Creature.” O what a glorious privilege, to be numbered with the Sacramental Army, going forth to conquer the world for Christ!

JOHN’S LIVING The great reason why we can’t evangelize the world is, the puzzling problem of ministerial support. The Bible answers all questions and sweeps away all difficulties. Here we have John the Baptist, the greatest’ preacher the world saw in four thousand years, and a paragon for all others to imitate. See this wonderful prophet of the desert, with a huge stone for a pulpit, and an audience of ten thousand, standing on the burning sand, listening hour after hour, so utterly spellbound that the sun goes down before they are aware. The preacher has nothing on his body by way of apparel but the coarse, shaggy, camel’s-hair mantle, worn by the poorest people, and tied around his loins with a strap of rawhide; i.e. , actually clothed like a beggar. Now what about boarding the greatest preacher the world had ever seen? It is an unequivocal truth that he lived on the locusts, sweetened with the wild honey gathered from the rocks in the mountains, as the “wilderness [desert] of Judea” is one continuous bed of rugged, precipitous, cavernous, barren mountains, where very little rain falls in the winter, and none in the summer, producing very scanty vegetation but a short period in the year. I am aware that great efforts have been made to explain away the idea that John really ate the locusts. There is a tree in the Holy Land called the carob or horn tree, bearing fruit eaten by poor people, much resembling the American honey-locust. Many have claimed that this was the food of John the Baptist. Even my Arab guide pointed it out to me as the food which John ate. I must state here, once for all, that the theory is utterly untenable. The fruit of that tree is called keration . ( Luke 15:16.) The prodigal son actually ate it, along with the hogs, which are very fond of it; while the word translated locusts, and specifying the food of John the Baptist, is akris, and has no meaning except the animal locust. Hence there is no dodging the issue without flatly contradicting the Word of God. So set it down as a matter of fact that John lived on locusts. This clear revelation of God’s Word is abundantly corroborated by all the collateral facts and circumstances appertaining to the case. (a) This day the locusts abound in the very country where John lived thirty years and entered upon his wonderful ministry.

I have seen them, in quantities so great that I could have filled a bushel basket in a diameter of a single rod. (b) It is a well-known fact that the Bedouins, living in the desert now, eat the locusts, not simply in case of emergency, but they are very fond of them, regarding them as a luxury, and devouring them voraciously, preferring them cooked, with salt, but eating them unhesitatingly raw, with salt if they have it, and without it if they have it not. They traverse the desert, hunting them; fill great sacks with them; carry them on camels and donkeys to their tents, and feast like kings so long as the locusts last. (c) The poor people in the desert, with whom John was brought up, habitually eat the locusts.

Of course they invited their preacher to eat with them, giving him such as they had; i.e., locusts sweetened with wild honey. My Arab guide, accompanying me when I saw the locusts in the “wilderness of Judea,” and dismounted so as to enjoy a good look at them, as they manifested no disposition to get out of my way, told me that they taste much like fish, and are quite palatable. I took his word, and was satisfied without testing the matter. The locusts which I saw were very fine looking, and several times so large as the grasshoppers in the American deserts, of which the Indians are so fond. (d) Good Lord, deliver us from criticizing Thy Word, and give us grace unhesitatingly to take the Bible as it says, and save us from all efforts to explain it away! John the Baptist had no money, and needed none.

We do not conclude from this that we should not give the preachers money, or anything else we have and they need. But we do conclude that the person who waits for money is out of God’s order. John had none, and was not in a place to get any. Myriads are now called by the Holy Ghost under similar circumstances. O how they grieve the Spirit when they wait, year after year, for money to defray traveling expenses, pay board, and purchase clothing and books, while millions are dropping into hell! I find men and women everywhere who confess that they are called by the Spirit, and are not in the work. An awful responsibility awaits them at the judgment bar. They should go, like John the Baptist, waiting for nothing. “The Lord will provide.” It may not be my way, It may not be thy way; Yet, in His own way, The Lord will provide.” If I could be a thousand men, I have open doors enough for them all to enter. What about the support? That is already settled with a draft on heaven’s bank.

Can we not have the faith of Sister Amelia Andrew, the wife of the sainted bishop? The Confederate War has swept over the country, a deluge of blood and fire, disorganizing Churches and revolutionizing society. General Lee has surrendered, and the war is over. Bishop Andrew, though now an octogenarian, is much concerned for the work in Texas, which has received no attention during the dark quadrennium.

He says to his sanctified Amelia, “O, how I‘d like to go to Texas, and look after the interest of God’s kingdom in the great ‘Lone Star State!’” “My dear, why do you not go?” “No money.” “I can send you to the boat-landing on Tombighee River, in my carriage, without any money.” “But what can I do when I get there, with no money to defray my traveling expenses?” “The Lord will provide,” responded the sanctified wife.

The venerable bishop acquiesces, and goes away by faith alone, without a cent of money. On arrival at the boat-landing, he meets a steamboat captain, a dear old friend, who kindly invites him to accept a free ride to New Orleans. On arrival at New Orleans, he meets a sea captain, a precious old friend, so glad to see him, who invites him to enjoy a free ride on his ship to Galveston, Texas. O how the Texans are delighted to receive him! God blesses his ministry. He stays long, sees the glory of God, and returns to his Alabama home with money in his pocket.

But this was a good run of luck. O no! It was the good providence of God.

I have seen it all my life. The difficulty of ministerial support is the devil’s trump-card, in the game he is playing with the Church for the damnation of the world. The argument in the case of John the Baptist is unanswerable, covering all the ground, and applicable under all circumstances.

JOHN’S INFLUENCE Matthew 5:6, & Mark 1:5. “Then there went out unto him Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the regions round about Jordan, and were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins.” Six millions of people are included in these countries. O the wonderful power and magnetism of John’s preaching! He actually emptied the cities and populated the desert with thronging millions. From dewy morn till dusky eve, the rich on camels, the middle classes on donkeys, and the poor trudging on foot, literally crowd the way, off into the desert wild and drear, carrying their food and bedding, that they may spend a fortnight in the grandest camp-meeting that the world has seen in four thousand years.

Water is very scarce in the “wilderness [desert] of Judea.” Traveling through it four times, I saw none but the Brook Cherith. I have heard of it, however, in other localities of that desert. Doubtless the scarcity of water to supply the multitudes and the animals they rode, as well as for baptismal demands, induced John to go away to the Jordan, only a dozen miles from this desert. The Jordan rises in great Mt. Hermon, ten thousand feet high, capped with a world of snows, all through the long summer incessantly melting, and keeping the river abundantly supplied with plenty of water for all purposes. Behold John, standing on the beautiful, spreading plain of the Jordan, surrounded by an audience of fifty thousand people, listening spellbound to his thunder peals, while the lightning of conviction is flashing from the skies, electrifying all hearts, with the gushing tears of a soul-crushing repentance. Moses was a great baptist, baptizing all the people at the tabernacle door upon the ratification of the Sinaitic Covenant. ( Hebrews 9:10-12.) Judaism, with its vast and operose ritual, the Messianic hemisphere, offering millions of slain victims, typifying the atonement of Christ, while the spiritual was equally operose, emblematizing the work of the Holy Ghost by the innumerable watery ablutions for the purification from all sorts of ceremonial uncleanness.

Hence the Johannic dispensation must be characterized by ceremonial purifications. At the present time, the Oriental religions gather by thousands upon the very spot where John baptized the Savior, the priest dipping the cross three times in the name of the Three Persons of the Trinity, they all simultaneously plunge themselves under the rolling wave of the holy Jordan three times; not doing this for baptism as the initiatory rite into the Church-this they have already received — but as a holy ablution to sanctify them, as they all believe the baptism of the Savior sanctified the Jordan. As John had neither the time nor the physical ability to handle his converts, they either plunged themselves under the rolling tide, or John, after the manner of the Jewish priest (and he was one), dipping the hyssop in the water, sprinkled the multitudes, somewhat as a Catholic priest nowadays sprinkles his audiences. The Jordan has plenty of water, and there is plenty in all parts of the earth. Be sure you satisfy your conscience as to this duty.

JOHN REJECTS THE HON TONS OF THE CHURCH Matthew 3:7,8; Luke 3:7,8. Among the teeming myriads, here came the Pharisees, with their boasted orthodoxy; and the Sadducees, with their “higher criticism,” cutting up God’s Word to suit their carnal natures, — both feeling sure that John will be glad to get them, and have their influence; as the Pharisees rule by their official power, and the Sadducees by their money. The trouble with great people is, they are too high for the graces of God, which, like water — their symbol — always flows down.

John had the spiritual gift which we all need, and it is our privilege to have; i.e. , discernment of spirits. He saw they did not repent — and good reason: they thought they were all right. That is the way Satan fills up hell with the great people of the Church. They will not repent, because they think they are Christians. While Satan has his arms round them, dragging them into hell, they think he is an angel of light, lifting them up to heaven.

God is no respecter of persons. The king has to be saved just like the crank, and the proud society woman must get low down in the dust, and cry to God like the poor harlot, whose heart the lightning of conviction has torn all to pieces.

THE ABRAHAMIC PATERNITY Matthew 3:8-10, and Luke 3:8-10. O the withering denunciations which leaped from the eloquent lips of John, like lightning from the skirts of the clouds! “Ye generations of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of repentance; and do not think to say among yourselves, We have father Abraham: for I say unto you, That God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. Already, indeed, the ax is lying at the root of the trees; therefore every tree, not producing good fruit, is hewn down and cast into the fire.” The rank and the of fallen Judaism at that day, like the Moslem millions now, as well as the unbelieving Jews, were depending upon their Abrahamic lineage to save them, pursuant to the infallible promises of Cod to that patriarch and his seed, constituting the Abrahamic Covenant. This is all a fond delusion of the devil, a greased plank, over which he has slidden countless millions into hell. Under the Mohammedan priesthood the barbaric children of Abraham, through Ishmael and Esau, this day expect heaven pursuant to the Abrahamic Covenant. Really there is no Abrahamic Covenant, but it is simply the Covenant of Redemption, which God made with His Son, before Abel died, to save all the faithful in Christ. This identical covenant God reiterated and established with Abraham. ( Galatians 3:16.) Hence the Abrahamic paternity is not carnal, but spiritual, including all the saved in Christ. ( Galatians 3:7.) The viper of the Old World is the congener of the rattlesnake in this country. The serpent is the progeny of Satan, having been subsidized by him in the abduction of humanity, and anathematized by the Almighty ( Genesis 3:14) in his transformation into the groveling, obnoxious, poisonous progeny of the archenemy. Stones here symbolize the flinty hearts of Satan-ridden reprobates, which the Holy Ghost is abundantly competent to transform into the sanctified children of heaven, thus making them the spiritual children of Abraham. The ax symbolizes Divine retribution; the tree, every human being. The whole human race are under a dispensation of grace, whether they have ever heard the gospel trumpet sound a solitary note. A momentous crisis came to the Jews with the ministry of John and his introduction of Jesus. Hitherto they could be saved by the Excarnate Christ, under the ministry of the law and the prophets. Now that He has come in human flesh, they must receive Him, or grieve away the Holy Spirit and take the fatal plunge into reprobacy and damnation. O what a flood-tide, led by those proud Church-rulers, to whom John was preaching this awfully plain truth, did reject Christ and take the horrific plunge into irretrievable woe!

GENUINE FRUITS OF REPENTANCE Luke 3:10-14. “The multitudes continued to ask him, saying, What then shall we do? Responding, he says to them: Let the one having two coats. give to him having none; and let the one having food do likewise.” John was no shoddy preacher, daubing with untempered mortar. He preached a gospel which will stand the judgment fires. “Repentance unto remission of sins” was his constant theme. A Methodist circuit rider, on his first round, preached on repentance; on his second round, gave them repentance again; and so on till the year is half gone. The people, tired and bored, asked him: “Brother, can you not give us a new subject? We are tired of the old one.” “O yes; but I am just waiting on you to repent, and can’t change my subject till you do.” He was right. All religion is shoddy and spurious without a true evangelical repentance, which is the only foundation. ( Hebrews 6:1.) Now true repentance always makes people philanthropic — doing unto others as we would have them do unto us.

When man repents, God always forgives, witnesses to it by His Spirit, and fills the heart with that love which will always do good to others. John’s doctrine is safe: “Repentance unto remission of sins,” R.V.; i.e. , you are to repent until you are forgiven, the Holy Spirit bearing witness. “And the publicans came to be baptized, and said unto him, Master, what shall we do? And he said unto them, Exact no more than that which has been appointed unto you.” The publicans — i.e. , the Roman officers collecting the revenue — had general notoriety for fraudulent exactions of more than their due, and rascality in their dealings with the people. John knew that a true repentance would settle all this crooked business, and settle it forever, which is true. O how we all ought to thank God for honest sheriffs, as I believe they generally are in this country! In the Old World, especially Asia and Africa, public fraud prevails to an appalling extent; e.g., in the corrupt Turkish Government, in the Holy Land this day, I am reliably informed that the sheriffry is sold to the highest bidder, the incumbent, instead of receiving remuneration from the Government, actually paying the Government for the privilege of serving in the office, and of course depending on theft and robbery for his entire remuneration. This is a simple item in the awful desolation which afflicts that land. Come, Lord, come quickly! Deliver Thy patrimony and a dying world from Satan’s power! “And the soldiers continue to ask him, saying, And what shall we do? And he said to them, Oppress no one, defraud no one, and be content with your wages.” Military despotisms have been the scourge of the world in all ages, but the true grace of God, superinducing repentance unto remission, transforms the panoplied soldier into a messenger of mercy.

Captain Webb, of the British army, was the first Methodist preacher in America. William Penn, an officer in the British army, became one of the sweetest preachers, whose lovely character ever adorned the Friends’ Church. (CHAPTER) - THE BAPTISM WHICH JESUS GIVES CONTRASTED WITH THAT OF JOHN Matthew 3:2; Mark 1:7,8; Luke 3:16. “I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance; but the One coming after me is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am unworthy to carry; He will baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire.” John and all other authentic preachers of the gospel administer the symbolic baptism with water, not only in this way sealing the covenant of repentance, but beautifully typifying the real baptism which Jesus gives with the Holy Ghost. Whereas, Matthew and Mark give us here the statement en hudati , the dative of instrumentality, showing up the fact that John used the water in an instrumental way, Luke simply says men hudati baptizo humas — i.e. , “I indeed baptize you with water” — omitting the preposition en , as you see, confirming the fact that hudati is the dative of instrumentality, clearly and unequivocally involving the conclusion that John handled the water instead of the people. This preposition en in this passage — used by Matthew and Mark and omitted by Luke — has several meanings, among which “in” and “with” are most prominent. God forbid that any one should think I want to encourage controversy in a matter so small and unessential as the quantity of water and the manner of its application! You read the Word of the Lord, and be sure you satisfy your conscience. ( 1 Peter 3:21.) We also have, in certain localities, a controversy involving the fire phase of our Savior’s baptism. Here, with the inspired Greek under my eye, I see that Matthew and Luke give us, “He will baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire,” while Mark omits the fire altogether, simply stating, “He will baptize you with the Holy Ghost,” clearly involving the conclusion that the fire normally inheres in the Holy Spirit — i.e. , is inseparable from Him: “God is a consuming fire.” ( Hebrews 12:18.) You know the Holy Ghost is none other than very and eternal God; therefore, when you receive the Holy Ghost, you receive the baptism of fire: “For He is like a refiner’s fire, and like fuller’s soap.” ( Malachi 3:2.)

Thus, fire and soap being the great purifiers, are here associated, denotative of that wonderful purification which the Holy Spirit always executes when you receive Him into your hearts. The teaching of a fiery baptism, separate and distinct from that of the Holy Spirit, antagonizes Ephesians 4:3, where Paul certifies that there is one, and only one, baptism in the gracious economy, the fire not being a separate and distinct baptism, but a concomitant of the Spirit; while the ordinance with water is not intrinsically a baptism, but symbolically typifies the real baptism of the Holy Spirit administered by our Savior. In connection with these facts, it is pertinent to consider 2 Timothy 1:6: “On account of which cause, I remind thee to revive and refire the gracious gift of God which is in thee for the laying on of my hands.”

The English word here, “stir up,” is anazopurein, which is a compound from ana , re; zao , life; pur , fire. Hence you see that the plain meaning of this triple Greek compound is “revive” and “refire.” We receive spiritual life in regeneration, but frequently need reviving, and will till this mortal puts on immortality.

We receive the fire of the Holy Ghost in sanctification, which should be revived and renewed, ever and anon, throughout our pilgrimage. You take food to revive your physical life, as otherwise it would evanesce, and you would die. You frequently put on fuel, stir up, and renew the fire, as otherwise it would go out, and you would freeze out in the North-pole atmosphere of this wintry world. Let us not get wise above what is written; but take the plain Word of the Lord in every Case, and you will keep out of these tangles, in which Satan is so fond of perplexing the people of God. There is no danger of getting too much life and too much fire if you get it from God. Man has fox-fire, the devil has hell-fire, and God has heavenly-fire. The Holy Ghost is God. If you seek a baptismal fire separate from the Spirit, you open the door for men and devils to deceive you with their “strange fire,” for which Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, fell dead when they offered it to the Lord. So beware, lest you offer strange fire to the Lord, and fall dead spiritually, as we seriously fear some are doing. If you seek any blessing separate from God, you run headlong into fanaticism. Feel perfectly free to get revived and fired all you possibly can, but get it all from God, remembering, amid all that God says, there is but one baptism. ( Ephesians 5:4.) Matthew 3:12; Luke 3:7. “Whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly purify His threshing-floor, and gather His wheat into the garner; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” In the blessed Word, God has given us “line upon line and precept upon precept” — knowing and pitying our stupidity, He leaves us without excuse. The preceding verse is a beautiful elucidation of the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire.

Another dangerous heresy has been deduced from these Scriptures; i.e. , that the baptism of fire here means the baptism of the wicked with hellfire, corroborating this Conclusion by the burning up of the chaff with unquenchable fire. Now, to the law and the testimony: “He will baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire.” Humas , “you,” in this statement of John, is the second person, plural number, and absolutely inseparable. The inspired Baptist here tells us most unequivocally that the very same, identical people shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost and fire. There are no sinners addressed in this pronoun, from the simple fact that John applies it exclusively to the people whom he baptized with water, and you know that he rejected even the great preachers and high officials of the Church who did not repent. Again, John refused to count the repentance valid till they reached the remission of sins. So, you may depend on it, there is no flaw in John’s theology. The people here addressed had repented unto the remission of their sins. These same people, whom John had baptized with water, he positively certifies, Jesus will baptize with the Holy Ghost and fire. Hence they are all Christians, and simply receive at the hands of the Savior the sanctifying baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire. You must remember that our Savior’s disciples were in this crowd, coming to Him through the ministry of John, who actually received this baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire on the day of Pentecost. “Threshingfloor” is the visible Church, which underwent a thorough purgation in the ministry of Christ, the Omnipotent Fan coming like a tornado from heaven, and blowing out of it the multitudes who lack the grit and grace to stand the truth, not even sparing the leading clergy and officials, cutting down the membership to one hundred and twenty who received the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire at Pentecost. While “Church” means the “called out,” having a subjective signification, the kingdom of God is objective. Hence they are called out in order that they may enter the kingdom here symbolized by “garner” — i.e. , heaven’s granary in this world receiving nothing but the pure wheat, ready for the Lord’s mill, and a grand festival among angels and archangels; while our Lord literally burns up the chaff with unquenchable fire, not meaning the wicked, who burn forever and are never exterminated, but the depravity in the hearts of God’s true people, which it is the province of a sanctified Church, through the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire, to utterly exterminate. Now, remember that Jesus does not gather the wicked into the Church, but the regenerated — i.e. , the wheat — in order that He may sanctify them wholly preparatory for immortal citizenship in heaven. This chaff has not an individuality separate from the wheat, hence it can not be applied to the wicked. You can not raise a crop of wheat without chaff. But you can raise a crop of chaff without wheat, as sometimes the grain is blighted, and it all turns out to be chaff and straw. As this world is full of depravity, you can have plenty of it without grace, but you can not, ab initio, have grace without depravity, which God will remove in due time, utterly consuming it with the fire of the Holy Ghost, graciously exterminating it, world without end. Luke 3:18. “Therefore, indeed, also exhorting them as to many other things, he continued to preach the gospel to the people.” We find that John was not only a wonderful preacher, but a powerful exhorter. Let me remind you all to seek the grace of exhortation. Preaching is generic, including exhortation and teaching — the former, to convict the wicked and bring them to God; and the latter, to edify the saints and establish them in holiness.

THE BAPTISM OF JESUS Matthew 3:13-17; Mark 1:9-11; Luke 3:21-23. “Then Jesus comes from Galilee unto Jordan to John, to be baptized by him.” Our Lord was six months younger than John, and hence He awaits the arrival of His majority — thirty years — before He will enter upon His official Messiahship. As John was sent from God to introduce Him to the world, he is the man to inaugurate Him into His ministry. “John continued to decline Him, saying, I have need to be baptized of Thee, and comest Thou unto me?” John was no exception to the human race, born with a depraved heart, which must be sanctified with a baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire.

Of course, I am satisfied that John already enjoyed the sanctified experience, like his prophetical predecessors, in advance of his dispensation. We are to understand this, as a statement of a great generic truth, that not only John, but every other human being, needs the baptism of Jesus to sanctify him for heaven. “And Jesus responding, said, Permit it now; for thus it is proper for us to fulfill all righteousness; then he permits Him.” Our Savior is Prophet, Priest, and King. The Levitical law positively required the high priest to have the anointing oil poured on his head, as Moses in the case of Aaron, before he is permitted to enter upon the duties and privileges of his office. This is the righteousness here pertinent; as our Savior never needed righteousness in the sense of justification, we are only permitted to give the word a ceremonial signification, complying with Old Testament law. “And Jesus, having been baptized, came up immediately from the water;” E.V., “out of the water,” is corrected in R.V., rendering it “from the water,” as apo does not mean “out of,” but only “from.” “And, behold, the heavens were opened, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and coming upon Him.” The Holy Ghost here assumes His symbolic form of a dove, becoming visible to mortal eyes. The cooing of the dove thrills the heart with melancholy, reminding us of the Holy Spirit, grieved over the wickedness of the world, and bewailing the hardness of the human heart. It is a significant fact, as is positively affirmed, that you can not make the dove angry; but you can grieve him so he will leave you and never return. “Behold, a voice from heaven, saying, This is My beloved Son, in whom I am delighted.” O what a popular sensation is aroused when John, on tiptoe, cries aloud, “Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!” thus boldly notifying the multitude that the wonderful Shiloh of prophecy, Redeemer of Israel, whom he has all the time been preaching to them, is already on the ground. All eyes are turned in utter bewilderment, looking about, and many shouting, “Where is He?” The multitude spontaneously crowd together, as if moved by sacred awe, forming a long aisle, through which the Prince of glory, walking down, meets their preacher, demanding baptism at his hands. Ten thousand eyes are now centered on this wonderful scene, the Prince of glory meeting the prophet of the wilderness at the baptismal waters. Luke says, “Jesus, having been baptized, and while praying, the heaven is opened;” simultaneously the Divine voice roaring out from the blue dome of heaven, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!” O what a stir throughout the multitude! Some say, “It is thunder, ringing down from a cloudless sky.” Others say, “That is impossible; but an angel spoke to Him.” Now, all eyes are strained and looking after Him. But He is gone, led by the Spirit away into the wilderness, to be tempted by the devil.

THE TEMPTATION Matthew 4:1-11; Mark 1:12,13; Luke 4:1-13. Matthew says that “He was led by the Spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil.” Mark says: “The Spirit immediately impels Him away into the desert. And He was there in the desert forty days, being tempted by the devil; and He was with the wild beasts, and the angels continued to minister unto Him.” Luke says: “Jesus, full of the Holy Ghost, went away from the Jordan; and was led by the Spirit into the desert, being tempted by the devil forty days. And He ate nothing during those days; and they being completed, He was afterward hungry.” I have gazed much upon the Mount of Temptation, lifting his bleak, rugged summit immediately west of Old Jericho, whose walls fell down responsive to the shouts of Israel, and about twenty miles from the ford of the Jordan where Jesus was baptized. It is a bleak, desolate, rugged, dreary region, inhabited only by wild beasts and robbers, unless the Bedoum, in his wanderings, here pitches his tent. The fact that Matthew and Luke positively state that He became hungry after the forty days, and Mark certifies that the angels were ministering unto Him throughout these forty days, involves the conclusion that He was supernaturally kept, in a state of spiritual rhapsody, like Moses and Elijah, during the forty days, so that He did not realize the sensation of hunger until after their expiration; and the ministering angels retiring, the natural, physical condition returns, and with it an intense sensation of hunger, as He had been forty days entirely without physical nutriment.

Mark and Luke both state that the temptation was going on during the forty days, while Matthew states that after the forty days, the tempter coming to Him, said, “If Thou art the Son of God, say that these stones may become bread.” From these concurrent testimonies by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, we conclude that during the forty days He was undergoing a temptation by the combined minions of perdition, and the powers of darkness turned loose against Him; meanwhile, the angels are present with Him, and through their sympathetic and consolatory ministrations, He enjoys a heavenly prelibation to such an extent as to fill His spirit with an unearthly rapture, the indwelling Holy Spirit, whom He had received when He descended on Him at the Jordan, so thrilling Him with heavenly ecstasy as to supersede and hold in suspense the physical appetites, so as to suspend the sensation of hunger during the forty days of angelic ministration. During this period, while evidently the powers of darkness are turned loose against Him, and doubtless the monsters of the pit swarm around Him, their hideous howling commingling with the growl and the roar of the wild beasts, yet, amid all, He enjoys a glorious victory, so that His spiritual rapture enables Him so to triumph over the physical destitution and depletion as to utterly suspend the sensation of hunger. At the expiration of forty days, the angels having retreated away, and the roar of the hell-hounds, the hissing of reptiles, and the ferocity of the wild beasts all combine to augment the dismal solitude and the awful peril of the situation, suddenly King Diabolus, having vacated his ebony throne in the Pandemonium, and assuming the form of a great and mighty man, like Napoleon Bonaparte or Alexander the Great, dressed in all the pompous costume of royal majesty, approaches Him, and enters upon a personal interview. The ministering angels have retreated away; His spiritual rhapsody no longer holding in suspense the physical functions, a fearful collapse of exhausted nature now supervenes, the intensity of His hunger, after a fast of forty days, being utterly inconceivable. Here we see Jesus at the greatest possible disadvantage. (a) He is in the enemy’s territory, surrounded by desolation and horror; the ferocious wild beasts ready to devour Him, and more ferocious demons and hellish monsters on all sides, every angel having retreated away, and the bright glory of heaven mantled in dark eclipse, with the awful intensity of hunger, super induced by a forty days’ fast. (b) In addition to all this, the prince of the Pandemonium, with the cultured intelligence of an archangel, now meets Him, with a personal appeal for a moment to lay under contribution His omnipotence, in order to satisfy His poor body with bread.

We must remember that, as Jesus was free from infirmity and from all physical ailment, which so frequently, in our case, suspends the appetite for food, His hunger subsequently to the expiration of the forty days and the angelic ministry was unutterably intense. While the Divinity of Christ could not be tempted, His humanity was tempted, in all the three great departments constituent to our being; i.e. , the physical, spiritual, and intellectual. (c) You observe from the inspired narrative that Satan made his first assault against the physical nature of Jesus, availing himself of the most superlative case of intensified hunger in order to induce Him to satisfy it by resorting to a miracle, which would be out of harmony with the Divine economy, because in probationary life we must be true to providence as well as grace, the former appertaining to the body, and the latter the soul; hence it was pertinent that Jesus, like every other man, should await the providence of God to satisfy His hunger.

In the case of Adam the First, Satan began with the physical, as now in the temptation of Jesus, it so turned out that he economized two thirds of his ammunition, achieving a complete victory in his first assault; i.e. , slaying Adam on the first round. If he had failed in the temptation of his body with the fruit, he would then have proceeded to carry the war with all possible expedition into the dominion of spirit and intellect. Not so in the case of Adam the Second; there, Satan used all of his ammunition and lost it all. (d) You see here the simple method by which Jesus defeated the devil: “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth through the mouth of God.” He is our Infallible Example, who alone has a right to teach the Christian soldier how to fight. If we will follow His example, we are certain to always have victory. You may fight the devil with your creed, and he will run over you rough-shod. Fight him with the plain, simple Word of God, and, like the Salvation Army song, “If you want to see the devil run, Always shoot him with a gospel gun.” (e) “Then the devil taketh Him into the holy city, and places Him on a pinnacle of the temple, and says to Him, if Thou art the Son of God, cast Thyself down; for it has been written, He gives His angels charge over Thee, to hear Thee up, lest Thou dash Thy foot against a stone.” ( Psalm 91:2) Satan is a great Scriptorian, always ready to quote it; but never giving it correctly. So you find Satan’s preachers, always twisting and turning the Word of the Lord to suit their creed. In this quotation, Diabolus very adroitly omits the clause, “In all Thy ways.” We can perfectly rely upon the keeping power of God, so long as we are in the Divine order; but when we get out, then the devil drops a lasso round our necks. In this assault — i.e. , Satan’s second campaign against Jesus — he directs his ammunition against the citadel of His human spirit, the receptacle of Divine grace and keeping-power through faith. Consequently the enemy makes a gattlinggun attack on His faith, using all of his chicanery to vitiate it, by turning it into presumption, which is the devil’s counterfeit for faith. O how Satan manipulates to supply the pulpits and the pews with this counterfeit at which is but a trap-door to let them fall into hell! The people believe their creed and support their Church, and presume that they are Christians, while experimentally ignorant of that faith which alone can move the mountains of sin out of their hearts. Again, Jesus uses the Sword of the Spirit, responding to Satan, “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.” ( Deuteronomy 6:16.)

This consummates the second victory which Jesus won in that memorable wilderness battle. The holy city here, as revealed by Luke, was Jerusalem, whose magnificent temple, so splendidly and artistically built and repaired by Herod the Great, had several lofty towers, to the highest of which Satan now leads Jesus, and having Him now in position and plight to leap away and take chances on the stone pavement several hundred feet below, he makes the bold challenge. It is about twenty-five miles away from the Mount of Temptation in Judea to Jerusalem. I trow, Satan, in gaudy sacerdotal robes, or perhaps royal regalia, in human incarnation, actually became the concomitant of Jesus for a period of time not here specified, but beginning at the end of the forty days. (f) “Again, Satan takes Him into an exceedingly high mountain, and shows Him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of the same, and says to Him, All these will I give unto Thee if, falling down, You may worship before me.” Luke states, “Because it has been given unto me, and I give it to whom I wish.” Here we see that Satan resorts to a positive and unequivocal falsehood; though he has a false claim on the world, and a dominion over it which he has usurped, and for the time being — for reasons not well known to us, but doubtless lying deep in the probationary economy — he is permitted, in a sense, to reign over the world during the present evil age. ( Corinthians 4:4.) Where E.V. represents God as calling the devil the “god of this world,” the true reading is the “god of this age,” as the world is to be gloriously redeemed after the Satanic age has come to an end. This is peculiar to Satan’s method of lying, especially to the people of God. While it is a substantial falsehood, it exhibits a phase of truth, in the simple fact of his usurped and temporarily permitted dominion over this world, which, even in the most plausible aspect, is subordinated to the sovereign, discriminating providence of God. We have no specification here as to what mountain this was. Mt. Olivet, east of Jerusalem, is the highest in all Southern Palestine. Mt. Pisgah, in full view, in the Land of Moab, east of the Dead Sea, is the highest in all that region. Mt. Hermon, two hundred miles north, ten thousand feet high, is actually the highest in all the Land of Canaan. As Luke says Satan “showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time”, he must have resorted to a panorama, in which he exhibited before the eye of Jesus all the time-honored kingdoms and mighty empires possessing and ruling the world at that time. This temptation was an assault against the powerful, unfallen intellect of Jesus.

The greatest minds the ages have ever known, have all been embargoed, darkened, and paralyzed by the fall. As an Intellectualist, the Man Jesus stands alone in the world. Do you not see in His life how all the genius and the learning of the world and the fallen Church were laid under contribution to confuse, tangle up, and perplex Him? In all the histories of the ages, no other absolutely imperturbable man has ever been found. All the sophistry of priests, theologians, and politicians combined, signally failed in any case to embarrass or confuse Him. This final assault of the enemy, on the line of human ambition, appeals to His wonderful intellect. Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus, Alexander, and Julius Caesar had deluged the world in blood, in order to conquer and possess it. These were all powerful intellectualists.

The greater the intellect, the more incorrigible the ambition. The Greek proskuneses not only means worship, in the sense of adoration offered to a god, hut it means that homage and civility which we extend to persons of royal rank and dignity. (g) You must remember that Satan before his fall was a great archangel, one of the brightest that ever shone around the effulgent Throne.

The Son of God is uncreated and co-eternal with the Father. Doubtless, during this interview, which was probably more prolix than we generally think, Satan adverted to their old friendship in the regions of fadeless bliss, and perhaps appealed to His sympathies; as amid those terrible troubles which had already resulted in his ejectment from heaven, he had resorted to an effort to enlarge his dominions by the accession of this world to the contracted regions of woe; and now, “O Son of God, that You have come to dispute my claim to the planet Earth, I propose to compromise the whole matter by surrendering up to You the sole and exclusive dominion of this controverted territory, with the understanding that You shall have it and reign over it forever, while I will reign in the dominion of Hades; meanwhile, I shall enjoin but one condition on Your part, and that is, that You and I shall be friends again, as in bygone ages in celestial worlds.” Of course, any complicity with Satan would have abducted the humanity from the Divinity, which, in that case, would have returned back to heaven, the plan of salvation collapsing forever. “Then Jesus says to him, Get behind Me, Satan; for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord God; Him only shalt thou serve.” ( Deuteronomy 6:13.) “Then Satan leaves Him,” as Luke says, “for a season.” “Behold, the angels came and continued to minister unto Him.” Here you see that a single stroke with the Sword of the Spirit repels Satan, and consummates the victory. There is now good reason for his final and utter withdrawal from the battle-field. Every army retreats the moment their ammunition is all expended. As Satan had no possible access to the Divinity, he could only work on the humanity, which, pursuant to the Divine similitude in which man was created, has but three entities — i.e. , the physical, spiritual, and intellectual. When Satan had turned all the battering rams of hell against these three towers of Mansoul, and in every case suffered signal defeat, he could do nothing more than retreat from the field, crestfallen and hopelessly defeated. What a decisive contrast with his first battle against humanity in Eden, where he saved two thirds of his ammunition, Adam falling on the first assault! But now, in his campaign against Adam the Second, you see he used all of his ammunition, and lost it all. Glorious victory for you and me, and all who, through evangelical repentance and humble faith, will receive it! (CHAPTER) - JOHN’S GOSPEL You observe, thus far, not a word has been said about John’s Gospel.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke all wrote historically. Consequently, they go much together, most felicitously corroborating one another. Matthew wrote for the Jews, fifteen years after the ascension of our Lord; Luke, for the Greeks, twenty-five years after the ascension; and Mark, for the Romans, thirty years after the ascension. John wrote for the Christians, not so much historically as doctrinally, experimentally, and spiritually, about sixty-five years after the ascension of our Lord. A.D. 95, Domitian, the Roman emperor, had John thrown into a caldron of boiling oil at Rome, to make soap of him. In the providence of God, his work wasn’t done.

Consequently he did not saponify, but enjoyed the hot bath, floundering round and shouting “Hallelujah!” Then the emperor had him taken out, and banished to the Isle of Patmos, in the Agean Sea. I sailed by it the other day in my detour from the Holy Land. At that time it was so infected with malaria as to be uninhabitable, and was used by the Roman emperors as a place of banishment for the worst criminals. His custodians arriving with him late Saturday afternoon, and throwing him out on the bleak rocks of that desolate shore, hastened away, leaving him alone, with the bones of his predecessors bleaching in the moonlight on those barren heights. The man of God prays all night. Next morning, which was Sunday (Revelation 1), the glorified Savior comes down from heaven amid lightning, thunders, and splendid corruscations, bringing heaven with Him; throws open the door, and invites His beloved apostle to look in, contemplate the wonders of the latter day, and write them to the people.

John spent the last years of his long and eventful life at Ephesus, the metropolis of Asia Minor, where history keeps track of him till A.D. 101, when, losing sight of him, we have no record of his death, Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, who lived in the second century, and John Wesley, as well as many others, believing that he was translated to heaven alive, like Enoch and Elijah.

THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST John 1:1-5. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” “Word” means revelation. The incarnation of Christ is the greatest revelation of God ever made to man. Hence, Word here simply means the Incarnate God. “The same was in the beginning with God.” Hence, you see that the Son, like the Father, is uncreated, never having had a beginning, and can never have an end. “All things were made by Him, and without Him there was nothing that was made.” You see from this, not only the co-eternity of the Son with the Father, but that He actually created all things; i.e. , the Divinity becomes creative in the Second Person. ( Colossians 1) “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men; and the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.”

Darkness is the concomitant of death, and light that of life.

TESTIMONY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST John 1:6-51. “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.

The same came for a witness, that he may testify concerning the Light, in order that all may believe through him. He was not that Light, but that he may testify concerning that Light. That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” John the Baptist clearly and powerfully preached the gracious possibility of universal salvation, involving the saving efficiency of Christ from the foundation of the world.

Darkness here means sin, and light means grace. Hence, you see that the true, saving grace of God in Christ is actually given to every human being, of all ages and nations, Pagan, Mohammedan, Papist, and Protestant.

Christ died for all, and by His Spirit shines on all. Hence, none will have an excuse for their own damnation, as all they have to do is to walk in the light God gives, and in that case, “the blood cleanses from all sin.” ( John 1:7) Hence, people are only lost for rejecting the light, as God only requires all to be true to the light and the grace given. “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not.” The Savior was unknown, misunderstood, falsely accused, unjustly condemned, and cruelly put to death. Two hundred millions of martyrs have added their blood to His for the same reason; i.e. , because the World knew them not. Jesus and the martyrs suffered condemnation and death as malefactors, while they were the best people in the world. Such will always be the case till our Lord comes in His glory. The people of this wicked world will never understand God’s true people. When they understand and appreciate you, an awful suspicion arises that you have gotten wrong. “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not;” i.e. , He came to the Jews, His own consanguinity, and given to Him in an everlasting Covenant. Because they were carnal and worldly, they misunderstood, disowned, and killed Him. If He had been carnal, like themselves, they would have received Him all right, as they did several false Christs within forty years after His crucifixion. But in that case, He could not have saved them, but must have failed, like all of those false Christs. “But so many as received Him, unto them gave He the privilege to become the children of God, to them that believe on His name, who were born, not of bloods, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” In this wonderful and beautiful passage, setting forth so clearly and gloriously the great fundamental doctrine of regeneration, the word translated “power” in E.V. is exousia, signifying, not only power, but more properly, privilege, right, authority. The word most prevalent in the New Testament and translated “power” is dunamiz — i.e. , dynamite, an infinitely stronger word than exousia . It means the very omnipotence of the Almighty; whereas, exousia here means the right or the privilege of every one that receives Christ to become the children of God through faith, salvation being optionary with the recipient; i.e. , you can all believe and be saved, or disbelieve and be lost. The specification here given on the negative side is exceedingly valuable, as it is God’s Warning against Satan’s delusion. “Not from bloods.” Until the date of this Scripture, all Church services consisted in bloody sacrifices. Hence the conclusion, that no one can be regenerated by water baptism, the eucharist, good works, or ritual ceremonies of any kind; nor “from the will of the flesh” — i.e. , you can not receive the Divine birth by the carnal will. “The Ethiopian can not change his skin, nor the leopard his spots.” Wonderful force in this Scripture! The black man may exercise all the power of his will, and put forth the greatest possible resolution to become a white man, and yet his skin remains black as an Ethiopian sky ever tanned. This certifies the utter impossibility of regeneration superinduced by everything we can possibly do. “Nor from the will of man.” The pope of Rome, and all the interceding priests on the face of the whole earth, and you may add to them all the apostles, if they were risen from the dead, can not possibly impart life to the dead soul of the sinner. As inspired John here well says, none but Cod can possibly do this work. When God calls you from death to life, He always reveals to you the glorious fact. How few, comparatively, have the witness of the Spirit that they are born of God! “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten with the Father, full of grace and truth.” As depravity, in all its forms and phases, is antithetical to grace, it is impossible for any one to be full of the latter and contain any of the former. A bucket is not full of water if it has a quantity of rock or dirt at the bottom. Hence, we see this statement annihilates a dogma somewhat now afloat; i.e. , that Jesus had depravity, having inherited it from His mother. “For we have not a High Priest who is not able to sympathize with our infirmities; He also having been tempted in all things, in like manner, without sin.” ( Hebrews 4:15.)

This Scripture sweeps all controversy from the field. They argue that the fact of His temptation is a proof that He had depravity. You see this Scripture covers all the ground, though He was tempted in all things as we are, yet He was without sin. The Word of the Lord is the end of all appeal.

Consequently this question is settled. Sin and error are Siamese twins, which always live and die together. Jesus was full of grace; therefore He had no sin, and no depravity, which is but another word for sin. Neither did He have any infirmity, which is the normal effect of sin. He was full of truth; therefore He had no error. “John testifies concerning Him, and cried, saying, This is He of whom I spoke; He that cometh after me was preferred before me, because He was before me.” While John the Baptist stood before the people as the forerunner and introducer of Jesus, he is very emphatic in his testimony to His uncreated eternity. “Of His fullness, we all receive grace upon grace,” or grace in addition to grace; i.e. , the grace of sanctification in addition to the grace of justification. “Because the law was given by Moses; grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” The law never had any power to save, but only to convict, and thus prepare people for the saving grace and truth which God gave in Christ. “No one hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, being in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.” Did not Moses stand face to face with God on Mt. Sinai? Did not the Lord visit Abraham’s tent at Mamre, and eat with him? These, like the “Form of the Fourth,” seen by Nebuchadnezzar in the fiery furnace, were all manifestations of Christ, the Jehovah of the Old Testament being identical with the Christ of the New, and the incarnate manifestations to Moses, Abraham, and Nebuchadnezzar being adumbrations of His first coming, like His appearing to Paul near Damascus and in the temple at Jerusalem, anticipatory of His second advent.

Verses 19-22. Here John relates the history of the Jews sending priests and Levites to John the Baptist, to interview him directly with reference to a problem much agitated among them; the learned clergy and theologians standing on the desert sand hours together, straining their eyes, looking over the long rolls of prophecies, diagnosing and investigating the phenomena of John’s ministry, and trying to settle the question whether he is the Christ; but finally sending their delegation to interrogate him in presence of the multitude, “Art thou the Christ or do we look for another?” John the Baptist puts a final quietus to all their inquiry by a candid and unequivocal negation, responding, “I am not the Christ, but the voice of one roaring in the desert, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, as Isaiah the prophet said.” ( Isaiah 40:3.)

Here, as recorded by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, John the Baptist certifies constantly and repeatedly that his office is to roar out the warning to the people to repent and make straight ways to the Lord; — i.e. , get rid of all their crookedness, so the Lord can come into their hearts.

Verse 28. “These things took place in Bethany, beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.” E.V. has here Bethabara, which is incorrect; Bethany, which means “house of dates,” being the correct reading. “The town of Bethany was ten miles up the Jordan in Perea, on the other side, the Baptist having moved thither since our Savior’s baptism.”

Verse 29. “The following day, John sees Jesus coming to him, and says, Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world.” This occurred the day following the transactions of the preceding verses, and after Jesus had been baptized and gone away into the wilderness, spent the forty days and more, and has now returned to the scene of John’s baptism, ten miles up the river, and on the other side, at the town Bethany. O that all the world would take this good, solid, Baptist doctrine! John the Baptist preaches no shoddy gospel, but entire sanctification all the time.

He does not represent Jesus as suppressing sin or conquering it, and leaving it, like a rattlesnake, coiled up. and hidden in the deep subterranean regions of the fallen soul; but he describes Him as taking it away, world without end. The world is full of counterfeit salvation, multitudes standing in the pulpit and preaching a counterfeit Savior, who does not take away sin. Remember that sin here is in the singular number, not meaning simply sinful acts, but the sin principle; i.e. , the body of sin, root, branch, germ, and seed, the entire entity, without any exception. It is the sin peculiar to the world — i.e. , the depravity — which, though operating in different ways, is identical with all races, colors, sexes, and nationalities. If you could leap through the earth, and jump out in China, you would find sin there just what it is here. Jesus came, not to wash, dress, educate, and control it, but to take it away. This is simple, unmistakable gospel truth, preached by holy John the Baptist. Good Lord, help us all to receive it and preach it to others! O how few this day stand up and cry, “Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!” Here, again, John asserts the priority of Jesus.

Verse 31. “And I did not know Him; but in order that He may be manifest to Israel, on this account I came baptizing with water. John testified, saying, That I saw the Spirit descending like a dove from heaven, and He remained on Him. I did not know Him, but the One sending me to baptize with water, He said to me, On whom you may see the Spirit descending and abiding on Him, the same is the One baptizing with the Holy Ghost. And I have seen, and I have testified that He is the Son of God.” We are not to conclude from these statements that John was utterly unacquainted with Jesus before the baptism, as they were related by consanguinity and the families acquainted. But God had revealed to John that he should have the indisputable confirmation of our Lord’s identity by the descension of the Holy Ghost on Him and His abiding there, thus revealing to John, and all the people, that He is truly the Christ, the only One in all the universe who baptizes with the Holy Ghost; John, His precursor and introducer, faithfully preparing the people by not only preaching to them a genuine, evangelical repentance, which was to be perseveringly perpetuated “unto remission of sins,” but it was his office also to symbolize the baptism of Jesus with the Holy Ghost and fire by the baptism with water. You see here in verse 34 that John, like Mark, omits the fire in the record, Matthew and Luke giving it, illustrating and confirming the fact, as attested by Paul ( Ephesians 5:4) — i.e. , the unity of baptism — the fire being a concomitant of the Spirit, and the water the symbol.

DISCIPLES OF JESUS Verses 35-43. “On the following day, John again stood, and two of His disciples, and looking upon Jesus walking about, says, Behold the Lamb of God. And the two disciples heard Him speaking, and follow Jesus. And Jesus turning, and seeing them following, says to them, What are you seeking? And they said to Him, Master, which is interpreted Teacher, where dwellest Thou? And He says to them, Come and see, And they came and saw where He dwelleth, and they abode with Him that day; it was about the tenth hour;” i.e. , four o’clock in the afternoon. The Apostle John, the author of this Gospel, is too modest to call his own name, always alluding to himself in some indirect way. Lord, help all of us preachers to profit by John’s modesty! How many are not satisfied with their names, but want D.D. and LL.D. added to them! Here, John specifies that Andrew was one of those two disciples, but does not give the name of the other, there being no doubt but he himself is the other one; and I believe, as these two were the first disciples of Jesus, that John himself led the way, being actually the first of all; as you see here they are falling in line, and following Jesus, at the instigation of John the Baptist, who, in the Divine economy, taught the primary department in the school of Christ, thus preparing His disciples for Him, as the disciples of Christ, including the apostles, were first the disciples of John the Baptist, this explaining the reason why none of the original apostles were baptized with water after they followed Jesus, they all having received the baptism of John.

Verse 40. “Come and see.” When John and Andrew, pursuant to the diagnosis of John the Baptist, said to Jesus, “Master, where dwellest Thou?” (“Where is Your lodging, that we may appoint a time to come and see You?”) Jesus said, “Come now.” Lord, help us to profit by Thy example, and quit all of this buncombe of appointing an hour to call! Now is the accepted time. Tomorrow may never come. We should be always ready for the Lord’s work. “The King’s business requires haste.” The sainted Miller Willis, during a fashionable, worldly, pseudo-revival, while the pastor, in a very formalistic way, was announcing from the pulpit that penitents could call upon him at his office at a stated hour, or, if they preferred it, call upon one of his official members at another hour, startled the whole congregation by a loud, sudden exclamation, “The Lord Jesus Christ is ready at all hours!” so that no burdened soul need wait a moment.

Immediately after John and Andrew followed Jesus, the latter finds his brother Simon and notifies him: “We have found the Messiah, which is interpreted Christ; and he led him to Jesus. And Jesus looking on him said, Thou art Simon, the son of Jonah; but thou shalt be called Cephas, which is interpreted Peter.” Cephas means rock in Hebrew, and Peter in Greek. The moment Jesus saw Simon, He looked down into the deep interior of his heart, and saw his wonderful solidity and stability, and consequently named him Cephas in Hebrew and Peter in Greek, which means rock. Did not Peter show much vacillation and instability? He did, till the sanctifying fires of the Holy Ghost, which he received at Pentecost, burnt out the vast accumulations of debris with which hereditary depravity had encumbered him. After this glorious work, the rock was clearly revealed to all who knew him. He was steadfast as Mt. Zion, and inflexible under the combined powers of earth and hell. He lived a hero and died a martyr. So it is with all of us; like Peter, we are unstable as water and unsubstantial as mud till we receive the sanctifying fires of Pentecost.

Verse 44. “On the following day [i.e., the day after Jesus called Peter], He finds Philip, and says to him, Follow Me. Philip was from Bethsaida, from the city of Andrew and Peter.” Bethsaida stood on the northwest coast of the Galilean Sea, at a great spring, which issues from the base of a mountain contiguous to a beautiful, fertile plain, quite convenient for the site of the city and its gardens. Jesus pronounced an awful woe against it ( Matthew 11:21), which has been signally fulfilled in its utter desolation, with scarcely a vestige to mark its situation, and many centuries without an inhabitant. As the situation is beautiful and the water excellent, it is a favorite camping place. Our party stopped and lunched there. This city was the home of Peter and Andrew and Philip. However, in the days of our Savior, Peter was a married man, having left the home of his nativity and settled in Capernaum, which became the home of Jesus after His rejection at Nazareth, and, as we believe, making the house of Peter His home. “Philip finds Nathanael, and said to him, We have found Him of whom Moses and the prophets in the law did write, Jesus the Son of Joseph, who is from Nazareth. And Nathanael said to him, What good is able to be from Nazareth? Philip says to him, Come and see. Jesus saw Nathanael coming to Him, says concerning him, Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile.” Nathanael is a Hebrew word, and means “Given of God.” We here see that he enjoyed the sanctified experience, being a guileless Israelite, confirmatory of the conclusion that he was saved from all depravity; i.e. , sanctified wholly. “Nathanael says to Him, Whence do you know me? Jesus responded and said to him, Before Philip called you, I saw you while you were under the fig-tree. Nathanael responded and says to Him, Master, Thou art the Son of God, Thou art the King of Israel. Jesus responded and said to him, Because I said to thee, I saw thee under the fig-tree, dost thou believe? Thou shalt see greater things than these And He says to him, Truly, truly, I say unto you, You shall see heaven opened, and the angels ascending and descending upon the Son of man.” Here we find that Nathanael was thoroughly convinced of the Christhood of Jesus because He saw him under the fig-tree. He was there alone, sequestered and hidden, and Jesus was nowhere about there, but away beyond great mountains and obstructions, so he knew that He had no chance to see him; hence, when He told him that He saw him, he knew that He was omnipresent, and believed in His Divinity unhesitatingly.

Here our Savior alludes to the ladder which Jacob saw in his night vision, while sleeping on Mt. Bethel. Hence we see that Jacob’s ladder, connecting earth and heaven, was a type of Christ, who is the Mediator between God and man, bridging the intervening chasm, and bringing heaven and. earth into intercommunication. “The Son of man” has a deep signification, and is quite a favorite phrase in the diction of our Savior. Humanity, before the fall, enjoyed membership in the Divine family. In the fall, spiritual life was forfeited and superseded by death. Therefore the wicked are denominated the children of the devil ( John 8:44), spiritual life and Divine sonship only being regained by the regeneration of the Holy Ghost. Now, since Jesus is the only unfallen Son of Adam, He, in an exclusive and peculiar sense, is truly the Son of man. (CHAPTER) - THE MARRIAGE AT CANA 0F GALILEE John 2:1-12. “On the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.” This marriage was the third day after His departure from Bethany, the scene of John’s baptism, that He may return to Nazareth, His home, accompanied by these four disciples — i.e. , John, Andrew, Peter, and Philip. Cana is about five miles east of Nazareth. At present it is said to contain one thousand inhabitants.

A Latin monastery occupies the site of the house of the groom, and a convent that of the bride, who were united in matrimony on the occasion here mentioned. We visited the spring from which they say the water was carried which Jesus turned into wine. This is more than likely, as it is the only one in the city, all depending on it for water. “Jesus and His disciples were invited to the wedding. And the wine failing, the mother of Jesus says to Him, They have no wine. Jesus says to her, What is that to Me and to thee, O woman? for My hour has not yet come.” Here we see that Jesus does not on this occasion recognize the motherhood of Mary; but He uses a word which, in the East, denotes great respect.

The truth of the matter is, Jesus is the common Savior of the whole world, and the time had come when that fact was to be recognized, His family relation no longer separating Him from the human race in its universal integrity. Hence He was no longer to be regarded as the Son of Joseph and Mary, but as the “Son of man” — i.e. , the Son of the whole human race, and the common Savior of the whole world. “And His mother says to the servants, Whatsoever He may say to you, this do,” thus illustrating the fact that she had a Divine inkling that something wonderful was coming. “And there were six stone waterpots sitting by, according to the purification of the Jews, containing about two or three firkins.” We constantly see the women walking to and from the fountain, carrying on their heads these great earthen vessels, filled with water, wine, or some other fluid. They exhibit great dexterity, walking about with them sitting on their heads, unsupported by hand. These six vessels would contain an enormous quantity of water, which was a guarantee against counterfeit; i.e. , if the quantity had been very small, legerdemain might have been brought to bear in playing off a delusion. But with so great a quantity, it was impossible for a stratagem to have been manipulated. “Jesus says to them, Fill the vessels with water. And they filled them unto the brim; and He says to them, Now draw out, and carry it to the master of ceremonies; and they brought it to him. And when the master of ceremonies tasted the water which had been made wine, and did not know whence it is, but the servants who had drawn the water knew, the master of ceremonies calls the groom, and says to him, Every man first sets forth the good wine, and when they may have drunken it, then the inferior; but you have reserved the good wine until now.” There was no possible room for any fraud in this miracle, as the whole crowd saw the water brought; and the same waiters who carried it from the fountain, immediately drew out the very same water and found it to be wine, the wedding boss witnessing to the fact. In this great and indubitable miracle, we have a magnificent illustration of regeneration and sanctification: the water uniformly symbolizing life, and the wine the Holy Ghost. When chemistry was unknown and alcohol accidentally discovered, they thought the change was due to spiritual influence, and consequently designated the alcoholized beverages as spirits. In the regenerated experience, we receive the water of life, and in sanctification, the new wine of the kingdom. In this illustrative miracle the Savior really teaches us how to get sanctified. Let regenerated people make the complete consecration, and then turn over their experiences to the Omnipotent Sanctifier, implicitly trusting Him to give them their sanctified experience. Then follows testimony, in which the seeker dares, with his eye of faith on the infallible promises, to testify to the experience, the leader of the meeting — symbolized by the chief ruler in this wedding festival — being the judge as to the genuineness of the experience. This problem is very beautiful, and if you will test it, will furnish its own solution in your happy experience of entire sanctification. All that these servants knew about it was the simple fact that they had put the water in the vessels. Now when wine is called for, they draw it out, and bring it to the master of ceremonies, having nothing to do with the wonderful change from water to wine, Jesus having effected the paradoxical transition. So you can not cleanse your own heart; but trusting the Omnipotent Jesus to do it, perfecting your faith by your testimony, you can rise and witness to the fact, the Omnipotent Sanctifier, pursuant to His own infallible promises, simultaneously, and in a manner to you indissolubly mysterious, can and will change the water of regeneration into the wine of sanctification. Glory to His name for His unspeakable grace! “Jesus did this beginning of the miracles in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory; and His disciples believed on Him.” Already He had called four disciples, whom afterward, with eight others, He commissioned as apostles. “After this, He and His mother and His brothers and His disciples went down to Capernaum, and He abode there not many days.” The brothers of Jesus were Simon, Judas (i.e. , Jude), James, and Joses, of course younger than Himself, as He was the first-born. The Roman Catholics claim that the brothers and sisters of Jesus were children of Joseph by a former marriage. Mere guess work, as we have no assurance that Joseph had ever been married before. We see here that they abode at Capernaum but a short time, because the Passover was nigh, and Jesus must hasten away to Jerusalem, in order to enter upon His official Messiahship.

PURIFICATION 0F THE TEMPLE John 2:13-25. “And the Passover of the Jews was nigh, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.” The Passover began April 14th, through all the ages of Israel, celebrating the exodus out of Egypt, when the destroying angel slew the first-born in every Egyptian home, and passed over the houses of Israel because he saw the blood of the slain lamb — which vividly typified the blood of Christ shed on Calvary — sprinkled on the doorposts and lintels of their houses. As this great Passover festival, to which the myriads of Israel gathered annually and spent eight days, typified the atonement Christ came into the world to make, it plays a most conspicuous part in our Lord’s ministry, marking the inauguration and the conclusion; as our Savior’s ministry occupied three years, beginning at a Passover, and winding up at another, and including two in the interim. You will find the division of our Lord’s ministry by these four Passovers a great convenience in studying the Gospels. The prophets had predicted that Christ would come at once to the temple, and purify it at the very beginning of His ministry ( Malachi 3:2,3); as you remember, He told His mother at Cana that His time to preach and work miracles had not yet come, contemplating entering upon His ministry at the Passover, which speedily followed. 14. “And He found in the temple those selling oxen, sheep, and doves, and the money-changers sitting.” Many and magnificent buildings at that time stood on the great and beautiful Temple Campus, containing thirty-five acres, in order to accommodate the thousands of Israel assembling at their great periodical feasts. These pollutions were not in the temple proper, but in those other buildings which stood on the whole ground, and were consequently included in the dedication to God. The end in view was to keep on hand a supply of sacrificial animals, ready to sell to the pilgrims, who came from afar to worship the God of Israel, the more wealthy purchasing an ox; the middling class, a sheep; and the poor, a dove. As all these foreign pilgrims brought Greek and Roman money, or that of some other nation, they had to exchange it for the Jewish half-shekel, the temple offering prescribed in the law, foreign money being rejected. “Having made a whip of rushes, He cast them all out of the temple, both sheep and oxen, and poured out the money of the exchangers, and overturned their tables, and said to those selling the doves, Take these away; do not make the house of My Father a house of merchandise.” The conclusion that He used the whip on the people is not sustained by the original. The long, nimble rushes were lying in quantities on the floor for the animals to lie down on. Taking some of these, He plaited them into a whip, and drove all the animals out, pouring out the money of the exchangers and turning over their tables. We see here a very obvious manifestation of His Divinity, as no other man in the world, ranking simply as a private volunteer, would have been permitted thus to interfere with all of those people in their business transactions. A Divine awe settling down on them held them, in a semi-paralytic suspense; astounded and lost in wonder, they are incompetent to interfere and prevent the expurgation which they see so strangely going on around them, through the intervention of this total stranger, their own acquiescence and nonintervention turning out to them even a greater surprise than the astounding invasion of the uninitiated Young Man, who is thus paradoxically exercising so much authority. “His disciples remembered that it has been written, The zeal of Thine house doth eat me up.” ( Psalm 64:9.) Oikos here means, not simply house, but family. Jesus is our Paragon. He was literally carried away and consumed with zeal for the promotion of God’s family in the earth. Lord, help us to walk in Thy footprints, sacrificing everything, “spending and being spent,” in the interest of God’s family and for the upbuilding of His kingdom in every nation! “Then the Jews responded and said to Him, What sign do you show us, that You do these things? Jesus responded and said to them, Destroy this temple, and I will build it in three days.” The authority by which He was purifying the temple was simply the fact of His Christhood, as that temple did not belong to man, but to God alone. Therefore His Messiahship, identifying Him with very and eternal God, actually gave Him personal charge of God’s house. Now, in view of the fact that His Christhood was confirmed and demonstrated by His death and resurrection, He points them to these great salient facts of His ministry as a demonstrative proof of His right to control the temple. “Then the Jews said, Forty and six years was this temple being built, and dost Thou rear it up in three days? But He spoke concerning the temple of His body. Then when He was risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He said this, and they believed the Scripture, and the word which Jesus said.” The Jews had even a superstitious veneration for the temple, running into idolatry in that way. Consequently they held this declaration against Him, clamoring over it ever and anon, and even founding on it a charge of blasphemy, for which, having hounded Him the three years of His ministry, on the day of His death they hideously howled for His blood; yet all this time having stupidly misapprehended His words, applying them to the temple edifice, while He meant the temple of His body, thus beautifully affirming His resurrection as the indubitable confirmation of His Messiahship. At that time, forty-six years had rolled away while building the beautiful and magnificent temple, under the patronage of King Herod, who ascended the throne sixty-eight years previously to that date, amid great political perturbations and much opposition, which, under Roman support, he, in a few years, exterminated in blood, thus centralizing and consolidating his kingdom, he devotes the balance of his thirty-eight years on the throne to rebuilding the temple in greater magnificence than any of his predecessors since Solomon. At the time of this record the temple was not yet entirely finished. So they continued the work, reaching its final completion A.D. 64. In A.D. 66, Gallus Cestius, the Roman general, laid siege to Jerusalem at the head of a great army, followed, in 68, by the Emperor Vespasian, who continued it two years, being succeeded by his son, the Emperor Titus, who consummated the destruction of the temple, the city, and the desolation of the land, in A.D. 73. As Jesus predicted that one stone would not be left on another, the Roman soldiers utterly demolished it, taking up the very foundation, hunting for the hidden treasures. “And when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed on His name, seeing His miracles which He was doing. But Jesus did not commit Himself unto them, because He knows all people, and He has no need that any one would witness concerning man; for He knew what was in man.” He is our only Exemplar. From His verdict and procedure here, we should learn a most important lesson; i.e. , never to put confidence in a human being. They are all fallible, mutatious, and unreliable. More human woe, wreck, disappointment, and ruin come in that way than any other. We should have no faith in man, but all in God, who never disappoints. Here our Savior inculcates a glorious lesson on entire sanctification, which throws a total eclipse over all the world, so we wear it like a loose garment, ready to drop it off at a moment’s warning; meanwhile, the true and genuine experience of full salvation sinks us away into God. (CHAPTER) - REGENERATION THE GREAT SINE QUA NON John 3:1-21. “There was a man of the Pharisees, whose name was Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews; the same came to Him by night, and said, Master, we know that Thou hast come a Teacher from God; for no one is able to do these miracles, which Thou art doing, unless God may be with him.” On the road from Jerusalem to Joppa, I passed through the city of Ramlah, now quite prosperous, with a population of eleven thousand, and a large element of Jews and Christians. It is on the Mediterranean plain, about fifteen miles from the coast. My dragoman told me that the current tradition points out that city as the home of Nicodemus. He was not only a learned Jewish rabbi, but, as we see here, he was a ruler — i.e. , a member of the Sanhedrin. Now that Jesus has properly entered upon His official Messiahship, the purification of the temple being His initiatory administration, He is preaching incessantly, and doing many mighty works, of which only a small proportion have been put on record by the four inspired penmen. It has been the privilege of Nicodemus, at this early period of His ministry, to hear Him preach and witness His mighty works.

That he is already under a powerful conviction is very clear from his admissions, and I have no doubt but he is this day a member of the bloodwashed throng, though we have no direct record of his conversion.

Learning, wealth, office, social position, ecclesiastical emolument, all conspired against him. However, when our Savior is on trial he ventures to speak in His vindication. Finally when He was cruelly murdered, Nicodemus gets bold, comes to the front, side by side with his rabbinical comrade, Joseph of Arimathea, and takes a most active part in the interment, furnishing a hundred pounds of valuable Oriental aromatics for the embalmment of the mutilated body of Jesus, thus boldly confessing Him in His death. “Jesus responded and said to him, Truly, truly, I say unto thee, Unless any one may be born from above, he is not able to see the kingdom of God.” “Man” in E.V. is not a correct translation of the indefinite pronoun tis, which means every human being that ever has had an existence or ever will.

Thus it is a sweeping and unequivocal abnegation of every human soul from the kingdom of God without this new birth from heaven. The statement of our Savior is absolute and unexceptional. “Again” is not a good translation of another, which simply means from above, affirming the absolute necessity of receiving Divine life from God out of heaven, administered by the Holy Spirit. Without this great intervention of the Almighty, heavenly hope is but the ignis fatuus, “Whose delusive ray Lights up unreal worlds, And glows but to betray.” It is only this heavenly nature that can even discern the kingdom of God.

Hence, unregenerate people are utterly ignorant of God’s kingdom, having all sorts of fantastical ideas about it, thinking it is the visible Church, or ecclesiastical rites and ceremonies, or something else, manipulated by Satan to augment the delusion and certify the damnation. “Again” in E.V. has led to the conclusion that the spiritual birth must always follow the natural, which is incorrect, and in that case would consign to perdition infants dying unborn; whereas the true reading, “from above,” is as clear in case of prenatal regeneration as the postnatal. “In Adam all die, but in Christ shall all be made alive” ( 1 Corinthians 15:22), involves the conclusion that every human being died in Adam, and shall be made alive in Christ. When God created Adam, He created the whole human race, as there never was but one creation, Eve being no exception to the rule, but a transformation from Adam’s rib. The theology frequently preached from popular pulpits, that infants do not need regeneration, and may be so brought up that they will go to heaven without it, is not only flatly contradictory of the Savior, but it throws wide open the Church door, and invites the devil to come in and run it. All human generation is in Adam the First, and consequently locked fast in spiritual death. “Christ tasted death for every one.” ( Hebrews 2:9.) The original, pantos, means every human being that ever has existed or ever will. You see in the Gospels of our Savior how He not only recognizes unsinning infants as members of His kingdom, but even holds them up for model members.

How is this? Whereas the whole human race fell in Adam, the propagation of the species on earth has always been in Adam the First. Adam the Second is the antithesis of Adam the First, the two running as parallel lines throughout the Bible, both representing the whole human race — the latter in grace, and the former in sin. Now, remember this grace is Omnipotent, always taking effect when not resisted by human agency. Before the age of accountability, the will has no power to resist the saving grace of God. As this grace is for “every one,” so soon as soul and body united constitute personality, this redeeming grace normally prevails, administering life to the dead soul. Of course, this is prenatal. Consequently, by the grace of God in Christ, and not by original purity, every human being is born in the kingdom of God, and only gets out by sinning out, as we see in the case of the prodigal son; both being born in the Father’s house — i.e. , the kingdom of God — the younger sinning out, and the elder staying in. This explains our Savior’s treatment of infants as model members of His kingdom. God’s time for people to be converted is before they are old enough to commit sin, as He has certainly made no provision for sin; and in that case, infantile justification would never be forfeited. Then in what would the conversion consist? Of just what it means — i.e. , a turning — as regeneration does not take away depravity, that being the prerogative of sanctification. Consequently all infants are born with depravity in their hearts, which does not condemn them, as it was transmitted to them without their volition; but it turns their faces away from God and predisposes them to go into sin. So here is the infant, born in the kingdom, with his face away from God. If let alone, when it reaches responsibility and starts off in its own way, it will go directly off, out of the kingdom, like the prodigal son. We should tell it about God, and its need of a Savior, and preach Jesus to it; get it convicted and genuinely converted — i.e. , get it turned round and introduced to the Savior, that it may get acquainted with Him, receive the brightness of His countenance and the redeeming benedictions of His grace, and showers of blessing falling upon its infantile heart, rivers of love springing up; it will then spontaneously start Out in the track of Jesus, heaven-born, and heaven-bound. Every adult sinner is a backslider, like the prodigal son at the hog-pen, and the thing for him to do is to come back to his Father’s house, where he was born. “Nicodemus says to Him, How is a man able to be born when he is old? Is he able to enter the second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” While Nicodemus was a great, learned, and influential preacher in the true Church of God, he was utterly ignorant of first principles; not only unsanctified, but unconverted. Doubtless his succession in the present age ought to be named “Legion.” The great trouble with Nicodemus was his materialistic doctrine, thinking that the new birth had something to do with his body. His successors this day identify water baptism with the new birth, thus making it a physical rather than a spiritual transaction. They certainly ought to profit by the mistake of Nicodemus, which our Savior so faithfully and decisively corrected. “And Jesus responded, Truly, truly, I say unto you, Unless any one is born of water and the Spirit, he is not able to enter into the kingdom of God.” The Holy Spirit is emblematized frequently in the Bible by water, wind, fire, and oil. That water in this passage symbolizes the Spirit, and typically includes water baptism, we do not call in question; but exhort all of our readers to fully satisfy their conscience on that subject. ( 1 Peter 3:21.) But that our Savior here means literal water, unless it be in this mere symbolic sense, just read on into the next chapter, where there is so much more said about water; the woman at Jacob’s Well thinking He meant the water in the well, but Jesus Himself correcting her misapprehension by stating that it is the water of life about which He is speaking, — and you have the problem solved.

Every one must be born of this living water and the Holy Spirit. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” The word here translated flesh, in E.V., is sarx , which is antithetical, not to the human spirit, but to the Holy Spirit, soma being antithetical to the human spirit. Hence sarx in this verse is a spirituality homogeneous to Satan, and dominating the body of fallen humanity.

Perhaps this verse would be better understood if it should read: “That which is born of depravity is depravity, and that which is born of the flesh is flesh.” “To be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is not subject to the law of God: for it is not able to be. Those who are in the flesh are not able to please God.” ( Romans 8:6-8) In these forcible Pauline Scriptures, the word in each verse translated “carnally,” “carnal,” and “flesh,” is this word sarx in the text. Hence, you see it means carnality, the carnal mind, depravity, original sin. In the fall, the Holy Spirit evacuated the human spirit, Satan succeeding Him by his own nature — i.e. , depravity. Hence the virus of the original sin is transmitted in all human generation, just like the poison of the rattlesnake; pursuant to which recognized fact, John the Baptist and Jesus call unregenerate humanity, “Generations of vipers.” It is impossible for the stream to rise above the fountain; therefore fallen humanity can never regain an inch of lost ground without a merciful Divine intervention. “Marvel not that I said unto thee, It behooveth you to be born from above.” This sentence follows a logical sequence from the preceding. All the culture of the universities, all the genius of the ages, and the royal blood of a thousand dynasties, can never add an iota of spiritual amelioration to fallen humanity. You dress up the gorilla like a king, and still he is a groveling animal. The Divine nature must come down from heaven, by the intervention of the Holy Spirit, and enter the fallen human spirit, in order to elevation a solitary iota. “You must be born from above” carries with it an emphasis, veracity, and force which earth and hell combined can never gainsay. Theologians may dodge it, ignore it, and explain it away; but still it stands, like a Popocatepeti, between every soul and heaven. “The Spirit breathes wheresoever He willeth; and you hear His voice, but you do not know whence He cometh, and whither He goeth; so is every one who has been born of the Spirit.” It is really astounding that the E.V. has “wind” in this passage. It is really inconsistent with itself, translating pneuma “wind” at the beginning of the verse, and “Spirit” at the conclusion. The English reader is doubtless surprised to learn that the very same word, pneuma, at the beginning of this verse, translated “wind,” also occurs at the end, where it is translated “Spirit.” Now, bear in mind that pneuma is the word constantly occurring for the Holy Spirit, and so translated; while anemos is the word for wind, but does not here occur. It is a significant fact that, while pneuma occurs so very frequently in the New Testament, being the word constantly used to reveal the Holy Spirit, this is the only passage in which the E.V. translates it “wind.” In connection with this exalted theme, so astounding and paradoxical to Nicodemus, with all his learning, our Savior in this verse beautifully alludes to the Divine sovereignty: The Spirit breathes where He willeth; i.e. , this heavenly birth, which is indispensable to salvation, is wrought by the Holy Spirit in the human spirit pursuant to His own sovereign will, of course responsive to the human conditions of repentance and faith in case of adults, but indiscriminately to all human spirits the moment personality obtains, responsive to the universal redemption of Christ. The reason why the world goes headlong to hell, is because they do not hear the voice of God, whose solution is the fact that dead men do not hear anything, and all are spiritually dead till quickened into life by the breath of the Almighty, when the Holy Spirit breathes into the human spirit the Divine life. “And thou hearest His voice.” The moment the Divine life enters the human spirit, the senses of the soul — i.e. , sight, hearing, smelling, taste, and feeling — spring into life, so that you actually hear the voice of God. “But thou dost not know whence He cometh nor whither He goeth;” i.e. , no one can possibly know the mysterious movings of the Holy Spirit. Frequently we see many at an altar, seeking: here one uses, with shining face, and testifies to the life that comes down from God out of heaven; while others, here and there, remain dumb. “Nicodemus answered and said to Him, How are these things able to be?

Jesus responded and said to him, Art thou a teacher of Israel, and knowest not these things? Truly, truly, 1 say unto thee, We speak what we know, and testify what we have seen, and you receive not our witness.” Jesus here severely, though lovingly, reprimands Nicodemus for his gross ignorance of the most prominent truth in the Bible, especially considering the fact that he was a teacher in Israel. When I crossed the Atlantic Ocean the second time, I became well acquainted with a very learned, highly cultured, genteel Roman Catholic priest, who, having been liberally educated in America, had spent four years in the Vatican College at Rome, and much reminded me of Nicodemus, as we conversed freely on Scripture, religion, and Christian experience, and he expressed inutterable astonishment when I told him that there was something in regeneration besides water baptism.

Doubtless Nicodemus has multitudes of gospel sons, in the ministry of the present day, as ignorant of regeneration as he was — to their shame and confusion, because they are teachers in Israel, standing in the pulpits to teach the people what they themselves know not. “If I told you things upon the earth, and you believed not, how will you believe if I tell you things in heaven?” Regeneration for sinners and sanctification for Christians are mighty and mysterious works of the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, but to be received in this life; i.e. , they are performed, not in heaven, but upon the earth. This entire life — probationary is but a beginning of an immortal career, that shall sweep on, accumulating new beauty, luster, and glory through the flight of eternal ages. Now see the force of Our Savior’s castigatory response to Nicodemus, “If you, a prominent teacher in Israel, can not understand the works which the Holy Ghost performs in our hearts while in this life; if you thus stagger when I tell you the stupendous miracle of the new birth, — what would you do if I should relate to you the ineffable glories which await the saints in coming eternity?” While Nicodemus was sincere and honest, as well as learned and influential, you see plainly he was hardly an abecedarian in spiritual things. Lord, help us all to profit by his deficiencies and mistakes! “No one hath ascended up into heaven, but He who came down from heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven.” While the humanity of Jesus was on earth and not in heaven, His Divinity was omnipresent, in heaven, on earth, and in all worlds. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, even so does it behoove the Son of man to be lifted up, that whosoever believeth on Him may not perish, but have eternal life.” Jesus makes this allusion to the manner of His death here, in the beginning of His ministry, reiterating it ever and anon throughout. If the Jews had put Him to death, He would have been stoned, this being the penalty for blasphemy, of which they falsely accused Him, crucifixion being a Roman punishment, never used among the Jews. Here we have the illustrative portion of our Savior’s wonderful sermon to the Jewish rabbi; having first given him the truth directly and categorically, He now enforces it by a familiar item in Jewish history, utilizing it to pour on His learned auditor floods of light, of which he had never dreamed. Three things God never created — i.e. , a devil, a sinner, and a snake. Originally, all created intelligences throughout the celestial universe were evidently on probation. In many of the heavenly worlds that probation has already expired, our earth rapidly hastening to the end. These angels, created in the different celestial worlds, “did not all keep their first estate” ( Jude 6), Lucifer — i.e. , lightbearer — one of the brightest and greatest of all the archangels, leading off the apostasy ( Isaiah 14:12): “How thou art fallen, O Lucifer, the son of the morning” — i.e. , the morning star, which is the meaning of Lucifer. John says “his tail” — i.e. , his influence drew after him one-third of the heavenly host. ( Revelation 12) God created man upright — i.e. , perfect [Hebrew] — but unfortunately abduced by Satan, who is fallen Lucifer, he sinned, thus forfeiting his probation, and becoming a sinner. The popular idea that a big snake tempted Mother Eve is not only unscriptural, but revoltingly unreasonable. Conceive a huge old boa-constrictor climbing up one of the trees of Paradise, projecting his monstrous head down over a limb, Opening wide his horrific mouth, and entering into a social conversation with Mother Eye, pure, holy, innocent, and sinless! How many of you believe in the feasibility of such a transaction? I, for one, am satisfied she would have turned her back and run like a race-horse.

The Bible says the nahash beguiled her. Now what was this nahash? We are informed that he was the most subtle — i.e. , the shrewdest, the most intelligent of all the animal creation, consequently ranking second only to man, who stood at the head of the zoological column. Many of the biped species at the present day, walking on two feet, using their hands, much resembling human beings; and even many of the quadrupeds (i.e. , the horse, the dog, the elephant) exhibit a degree of intelligence decidedly superior to that of the serpent. I doubt not but the nahash which tempted humanity was a biped, and, as you see from the Bible, having the power of oral communication. Consequently it was no surprise to Mother Eve when he spoke to her. You see the result of his subordination by Satan, and utilization as his medium in the abduction and ruin of the human race, resulted in his own transformation, pursuant to the righteous anathema which God pronounced on him because of the mischief he had done: “Because thou hast done this, on thy stomach thou shalt go, and dust shalt thou eat, all the days of thy life; and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” ( Genesis 3:14,15.)

Methinks I see the nahash, a biped, the intermediate link between man and the animal creation, standing up in the presence of Jehovah, receiving the awful, withering woe, justly following his unfortunate instrumentality in human ruin as a righteous retribution. Meanwhile his awful doom is ringing out on the balmy breezes of Eden; the transformation supervenes, his neck and head assuming a fearful elongation and a hideous deformity, his arms absorbed and disappearing, his posterior members consolidated; the long, hideous body, followed by the obnoxious, wriggling tail, tumbling prostrate on the ground, and running away amid the roses and lilies with horrific hissing and hideous coils, now and henceforth the detestable, venomous serpent, having inherited the narcotic poison from the devil, which he transmits through his cruel teeth, slaying his victims, and vividly emblematizing the awful power and effect of sin.

When Israel refused to pass into Canaan from Kadesh-barnea, the nigh way, and, following the advice of the cowardly spies, turned back into the dreary desert of Arabia, God put them under an awful discipline, sending among them destroying angels, wasting pestilences, and fiery serpents.

They have pitched their tents on the desert sands. The whole earth seems to be full of snakes, which did not appear on the surface; but having their dens in the sands, and caverns, which everywhere abound, they issue from the earth, come into the tents, wound the people, and they are dying on all sides. The word “fiery” means the awful narcotic poison which these horrific reptiles imparted to their victims. The ordeal is terrible. They die too fast to bury them. The camp is heaped with mountains of the dead.

Moses, who carries the millions of Israel on his breast, falling on his knees, intercedes with Jehovah in importunate pleading in behalf of the dying.

The Divine response orders him to manufacture a brazen serpent, after the most perfect similitude to these awful, poisonous reptiles; suspending it high on a pole, elevated high on the pinnacle of the tabernacle, in the center of the encampment; simultaneously sending swift couriers throughout all the tribes of Israel, with trumpet voices, calling aloud to all, to notify the wounded and the dying to behold the brazen serpent, shining in the splendid air of that cloudless, Oriental sky, where the brand new brazen serpent so radiated the splendors of an Arabian sun as to literally shine with an effulgence dazzling the eye. To the unutterable joy of the hosts, every one that looks is instantaneously healed. The result is, a wave of joyous enthusiasm rolls over the vast encampment, as a thousand people in a minute, from different directions, are gloriously healed by a look at the bright brazen serpent, suspended high in the air. These all run precipitately every way, shouting the good tidings. A few minutes have flown; ten thousand witnesses are running at race-horse speed through the encampment, shouting uproariously the glad tidings. O, what a happy exchange of the mournful wails which a few minutes ago rang in lugubrious howls throughout the vast encampment! Now they‘re exchanged for shouts of joy, everywhere roaring and reverberating in the air. O, how beautiful, how grand the similitude we here find, and how gloriously illustrating the mighty work of our Christ! You see, the brazen serpent was made in the form of the fiery serpents. Do you not know that we all became a race of snakes in the fall? Jesus and John the Baptist called us generations of vipers. You have heard the old maxim, “It takes a rogue to catch a rogue.” Our Savior took the form of us snakes, so He could run into all the snake holes and dens in all this wicked world, and save them. In order to reach us poor, lost sinners, it was necessary that He be a Man, looking like one of us, and actually mistaken by the preachers in His day and killed for a bad man.

You see in that notable wilderness transaction a wonderful exemplification of the primary truth appertaining to the plan of salvation: (a) That brazen serpent was perfectly clean and pure.

Though having the very form and looking like the poisonous serpents which infested the camp, it had not a single atom of poison in it. Hence it follows, as a legitimate sequence, that though Jesus had the form and looked just like the people of this world, who are all full of sin — i.e. , totally depraved — He had not a particle of sin nor infirmity of any kind, but was perfectly pure and sinless. (b) As those bitten Israelites were poisoned throughout (which you know to be true, as poison is a blood trouble, and by the circulation carried into all parts of the Organism; the blood being the constituent element, every tissue of the constitution is contaminated); hence it follows that the virus of inbred sin — i.e. , the poison of the serpent has reached every fiber of the spiritual organism.

See those Israelites had nothing to do but look on the brazen serpent, and they were all healed. Therefore you see that all the sinners of this world have to do is to believe on Jesus; as here you see that our Savior makes faith, on our part, synonymous with the looking in the case of those dying Hebrews. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him may not perish, but have eternal life.” You see in this beautiful passage, enunciated by our Savior, that the love of the Father is the great, fundamental fact underlying the plan of salvation. “He that believeth on Him is not condemned; but he that believeth not, has already been condemned, because he hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God.” O how grandly, indubitably, and irrefutably does Jesus preach salvation through faith alone! Of course, this is the same gospel which John the Baptist preached from the standpoint of repentance, which must, in every case, precede justifying faith, as it is the only believing ground John the Baptist preached repentance, thus establishing the people on believing ground, and thus preparing them to receive the gospel of Jesus by faith. Here our Savior certifies that He did not come to condemn the world, but to save it. Where there is sin, condemnation is an inevitable concomitant. Now what is the attitude of the Churches at the present day, both Papal and Protestant? We are sad to say that, with few exceptions, they preach a sinning religion, which must keep their members under perpetual condemnation. The consequence is, they preach a Christ of condemnation, inculcating the dogma that He saves them in their sins. Do you not know that this is untrue, and that a Christ of condemnation it not the Christ of the Bible, but an idolatrous Christ?

Because the Christ of the Bible, as He here says, did not come to condemn, but to save, and actually does save, all who come unto God through Him.

Hence, in order to worship the Christ of the Bible, you must receive Him in the capacity of Savior from all your sins, as any other acceptation would not apply to the true Christ of the New Testament at all, but simply implicates you in idolatry, as the worshiper of a false Christ. 19. “This is the condemnation, that light has come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light; for their deeds are evil, and every one doing evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, in order that his works may be convicted; he that doeth the truth cometh to the light, in order that his works may be made manifest that they have been wrought in God.” Right here, Satan so adroitly manipulates to deceive the multiplied millions of candid worshipers in all sexes and nationalities, a person has to have a deep conviction, like David, who said, “The sorrows of death encompassed me, and the pains of hell got hold of me,” before he will make up his mind to come to the light, have all his evil deeds exposed, and embark in what is to him a forlorn enterprise of getting rid of them altogether. Entire sanctification is the only religion that faces the music of heaven, and says: “Give me all the light, and reveal all of my meanness; let me see the very worst; and help me, O God, to be true to the heavenly calling unto an uttermost salvation.” It is the only religion that withholds nothing, makes no compromise under any circumstances; but walks in the clear and cloudless light of God’s Word, Spirit, and providence, realizing that “the blood cleanses from all sin.” O the millions of souls now in hell because they never did make a clean breast, and seek the clear and cloudless light! When we courageously walk in all the light which God gives us, our wrongdoing all being convicted and brought into the full blaze of heaven’s cloudless day, faithfully put under the blood, confidingly committed to the consuming fires of the Holy Ghost, doubtlessly relying upon Omnipotent Grace for their utter extermination — soon will come the happy crisis in our experience, when the Holy Spirit will witness to our spirit “that our deeds are wrought in God.” (CHAPTER) - JESUS PREACHING IN THE COUNTRY John 3:22-26. “After these things, Jesus and His disciples came into the Judean country, and He there tarried with them, and baptized.” Our Lord, having begun His ministry in Jerusalem in the purification of the temple, avails Himself of the vast multitudes attending the Passover to preach His glorious gospel, and corroborate it by working miracles; after the Passover, He goes out into the country, there continuing His preaching, meanwhile His disciples baptizing His converts; as it was the prerogative of Jesus to baptize with the Holy Ghost. “And John was baptizing in Enon, near unto Salim, because there were many waters there; and they continued to come and be baptized; for John had not yet been cast into prison.” Jesus, accompanied by His disciples, went out into the country north of Jerusalem, there prosecuting His ministry, and John, having left Bethany, east of the Jordan, had come back to the west side, and is now preaching in Enon near Salim, this being a valley running down into the Jordan from the west. Enon is a Chaldaic word, in the plural number, which means “springs,” “because there were many waters there” — i.e. , a land abounding in springs; to this our dragoman testified when he pointed it out to us. The multitudes attending John’s ministry needed abundant supply of water for their animals and culinary operations, while John wanted an ample quantity for his baptismal administrations. The destitution of water in so many localities in that semi-tropical country Occasions frequent allusions to it, such as we do not have in a land like ours, everywhere abounding in an ample supply of this indispensable providence. “Then there was a dispute from the disciples of John with the Jews concerning purifying.” Here we have a clear definition of baptism, as in a number of other passages, which we will meet in the gospel of our Savior.

The context here shows most unequivocally that this dispute involved the relative importance of the baptisms administered by John and the disciples of Jesus, while we see that purifying is the clear, salient, and unequivocal definition of this word baptism, in reference to which there has been much controversy. You will find the same definition in Mark 7 and Luke 11. The Old Testament economy exhibits two grand symbolic hemispheres — the bloody sacrifices typifying the work of Christ, and the watery ablutions that of the Holy Ghost. We are now in a grand transition period, and a time celebrated for purifications, the Johannic dispensation constituting the intermediate link between the law and the gospel, John being the last of the prophets, and thus preaching the valedictory of the Old Dispensation, and the honored harbinger of the New, introducing to the world the Savior, for whom they had looked four thousand years; baptizes all of his converts, thus symbolizing the purification necessary to enter his own dispensation, which is the initiatory of the kingdom. Now, our Savior, having been inaugurated into His ministry by John the Baptist, proceeds to unfurl the blood-stained banner of the kingdom which John had assured them was at hand, and have His converts baptized by His disciples, thus symbolizing a higher promotion and a deeper and richer grace than the initiatory gospel which John preached. As the ministry of John and Jesus brought to Israel the greatest revivals they had ever seen, these grand and glorious benedictions, which were falling in copious showers from God out of heaven, are abundantly and beautifully symbolized by water baptism, here (verse 25) denominated purifying.

This definition was very familiar, and well understood by all the Jews, who, from the days of Moses, had been accustomed to these aquatic ablutions for the removal of ceremonial defilement, which they were liable to contract in many ways; e.g., coming in contact with Gentiles, dead bodies, lepers, and unclean animals. Hence, to the Jewish mind, there was a deep and obvious significance in these baptisms with water.

TESTIMONY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST John 3:22-36. “And they came to John, and said to him, Master, He who is with thee beyond Jordan, and to whom thou hast borne witness, behold, the same baptizeth, and all are coming unto Him.” For more than six months, John had been, not only the sensation of Israel, but of the world. But a few days ago, Jesus, having been baptized by John, has begun to preach. Whereas John wrought no miracles, Jesus, from the beginning, electrified the people with his stupendous miracles. Now they are so close together that intercommunication is going on between their disciples. Some of these honest, well-disposed disciples of John wait on him, with the news that the multitudes are all pouring now to Jesus, who is preaching and baptizing (through his disciples) as well as John. “John responded and said, A man is not able to receive anything unless it may be given unto him from heaven. You testify to me that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before Him.” Here John corrects the idea of his informants that Jesus was a rival of his, and about to supersede him in his office and ministry. “The one having the bride is the Bridegroom, but the friend of the Bridegroom, standing and hearing Him, rejoiceth with joy on account of the voice of the Bridegroom; therefore this my joy is complete.” John being an Old Testament prophet, classifies himself with the saints of the former dispensation, here, as you see, abnegating their identity with the bridehood of Christ, and only claiming to be the friends of the Bridegroom. O, how fortunate we are to live in the gospel dispensation, having access to the richest blessing this side of heaven — i.e. , the bridehood of Christ — as here you see that Christ wooes, wins, and weds His loving bride after His incarnation, the Old Testament saints, even including John the Baptist, being friends of the Bridegroom! “It behooves Him to increase, and me to decrease. He that cometh from above is above all; the one being from the earth is of the earth, and speaketh of the earth.” All John means here is, that he is simply a man, a member of the human race, like all others, while he is impressing the people that Jesus is Divine, having come down from heaven; thus he is illustrating the infinite difference between them. “The one coming from heaven is above all; and whatsoever He has seen and heard, this He testifies, and no one receives His testimony.” This sounds rather strange, that no one receives His testimony. It is a simple statement of a fact.

Among the multitudes who are crowding in His track and thronging His ministry at this early day, we do not know that any one, except John the Baptist, entertained a correct conception of His Messiahship. They believed on Him on account of His miracles; but Elijah and Elisha had both wrought great miracles, even raised the dead. They believed on Him as a mighty prophet sent of God; but it was late in His ministry before even His apostles came out in an unequivocal confession of His Christhood. “He that receiveth His testimony hath set to his seal that God is true.” All the revelation Which God had ever given to Israel in the Old Testament culminated in Christ. When you write a letter, last of all you seal it. So the advent of Christ sealed — i.e. , indubitably confirmed — all the Scriptures that had ever been written. Hence, the one receiving Him has a perfect faith, sealed against all further doubt and uncertainty. Experimentally, we. receive this seal from God in entire sanctification. “For whom God sent, speaketh the words of God; for God does not give His Spirit by measure.” Jesus, having no depravity nor infirmity to impede the fullness of the Spirit, was literally filled and flooded, soul, mind, and body, all the time. It is our privilege to be like Him. “Every one who has been made perfect shall be as his Master” ( Luke 6:40) Entire sanctification removes every impediment to the incoming of the Holy Ghost. O, what a glorious privilege to receive Him without measure as an incoming flood, overmastering Niagara, and an inundating sea! “He that believeth on the Son bath eternal life; but he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.” O how clear and explicit John the Baptist here corroborates the preaching of Jesus, in this same chapter certifying most unequivocally that the one who believes on the Son already has eternal life! God help us all to believe Thy Word as here so clearly preached by Thy servant, John the Baptist! How awful the doom of the unbeliever, as he shall not so much as see life, much less enjoy it, through all eternity, while the wrath of God, which is poured out on all sinners, “abideth on him!” This verb “abideth” is the perpetual present, setting forth the fact that it will never cease through all the ages of eternity.

The wrath of God is already on the sinner. Jesus came to take it off. He can not do it unless the sinner believes on Him. So here, in this verse, we have a clear and unequivocal affirmation of the endless punishment which awaits the wicked. The rapid increase of infidelity in the world is an exceedingly distressing phenomenon, ominous, with other signs, of our Lord’s near coming. Thus this wicked world is fast ripening for destruction. Not only is this phenomenon fearful in heathen lands, where infidel preachers are now zealously proclaiming their soul-destroying lies, the multitudes dropping their heathen religions and espousing infidelity; but especially in gospel lands do we see, to our sorrow, a wonderfully rapid spread of infidelity within the last ten years. As I travel from ocean to ocean, I meet this sad phenomenon, to the grief of my spirit. In some of our large cities, nearly every other man I interview about his soul, avows down right infidelity; while church members and even their pastors, by millions are fearfully diluted with it, so that they openly proclaim, from pulpit and pew, their skepticism in reference to portions of God’s revealed truth.

JESUS GOES TO GALILEE Matthew 4:12; Mark 1:14; & Luke 4:14. “And after that John was cast into prison, Jesus came unto Galilee.” Having entered upon His official Messiahship by purifying the temple at the Passover, and preached to the multitudes gathered on the Temple Campus during the great national feast; delivered that wonderful discourse to Nicodemus at night, the Apostle John bearing witness; and having wrought many miracles of which we have no specification; after the Passover, going out into the country north of the metropolis, He continues to preach and work miracles, His disciples baptizing the people, John the Baptist preaching in Enon near by, so that intercommunication between the audiences springs up, all observing that while Jesus is rapidly rising and magnetizing the multitudes, John is waning, — a crisis supervenes, resulting from the arrest of John the Baptist by Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great, and king of Galilee and Perea. Immediately after this, Jesus leaves Judea, and goes away to Galilee, apparently because of John’s arrest and imprisonment lest a similar fate shall overtake Him, and thus interfere with the work which He came to do. We see many judicious precautions adopted by Him at different times in order to prevent the interruption of His ministry till His work is done, ARREST & IMPRISONMENT OF JOHN THE BAPTIST Matthew 14:3-5; Mark 6:17-20; Luke 3:19-21. Mark: “For Herod himself, having sent, arrested John, and bound him in prison, on account of Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip, because he married her.

For John said to Herod, It is not lawful for thee to have the wife of thy brother. And Herodias hated him, and wished to kill him; and was not able. For Herod revered John, knowing him to be a righteous and holy man; and he continued to hold him in prison, and hearing him, continued to do many things, and he was hearing him delightfully.” Matthew: “And wishing to kill him, he feared the multitude, because they had him as a prophet.” Luke: “And Herod the tetrarch, being convicted by him concerning Herodias, the wife of Philip, his brother, and concerning all those wicked things which Herod did, added also this to all, he also shut up John in prison.” We see from the concurrent histories of this dark tragedy, as given by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, that John the Baptist extended no royal courtesy whatever to the king and queen; but, looking them in the face, thus boldly and fearlessly exposed them in the presence of all the people, pronouncing his withering condemnation against their unlawful matrimony, Herodias, being the legal wife of his brother Philip — not the Philip who was at that time tetrarch of Iturea and Trachonitis ( Luke 3:1), but of another Philip, who was his half-brother. Here we see a notable case of an honest preacher going into prison and to the executioner’s block, losing all his liberties, and even his life, rather than withhold a solitary item of the truth. If the preachers nowadays were to expose and condemn all of the unlawful marriages in their congregations, thousands of them would lose their pastoral heads, especially in the wealthy city churches. O how the present age needs preachers having the backbone of John the Baptist! This illustrates the absolute necessity of entire sanctification on the part of the clergy, as nothing but this grace can qualify the preacher to tell the truth under all circumstances, regardless of his reputation, financial interest, and his ecclesiastical head. In this whole transaction, Herod shows up a better spirit than Herodias. You see plainly from Mark that Herod imprisoned John, and kept him in prison nearly two years, to keep Herodias from killing him. If he had not been protected by those impregnable prison-walls, and kept night and day under lock and key, the queen would have hired an assassin to go and murder him.

Machaerus, a city and strong fortification, which our dragoman pointed out to us, on the east bank of the Dead Sea, where Herod also had a palace and spent a portion of his time, was the place of John’s imprisonment.

During these twenty months, which wound up with his decapitation through the stratagem of Herodias, Herod frequently heard John preach.

Mark says: “Knowing him to be a righteous and holy man.” We become righteous in regeneration, and holy in sanctification. Hence you see that King Herod, an intelligent, unconverted Church-member, had gumption enough to believe in the two works of grace — i.e. , regeneration and sanctification — and see them both in John the Baptist. Mark here informs us that John’s preaching had a powerful effect on Herod, who, like multiplied thousands of unsaved Church-members, wanted to be good. “And hearing him, he continued to do many things, and he continued to hear him delightfully.” All this took place during those twenty months of his imprisonment at Machaerus, where Herod had a palace, and spent much of his time, meanwhile holding John in prison to keep his haughty wife from having him killed, she, of course, being too mad at him to ever hear him any more, though her royal husband heard him very frequently, ever and anon, and was delighted with the wonderful truth so ably and faithfully dispensed by his prisoner. “He continued to do many things;” i.e. , he was very religious, and obeyed John in many things, being literally carried away by the red-hot truth which he preached; yet he never made the final surrender and got saved; finally permitting his diabolical wife to constrain him to imbue his hands in the innocent blood of the preacher under whose ministry he had been delighted these two years, shed many a tear, and made many a holy vow. (CHAPTER) - JESUS PREACHES TO THE SAMARITAN WOMAN John 4:1-41. “When our Lord knew that the Pharisees heard that Jesus is making and baptizing more disciples than John (indeed, Jesus himself did not baptize, but his disciples), he left Judea, and departed again into Galilee.” While the English construction leaves here an open problem, susceptible of the conclusion that Jesus did baptize His disciples, remember once for all that such an inference is utterly and positively precluded by the Greek, which sweeps all controversy from the field, and settles the matter positively and unequivocally that Jesus did not baptize any person with water, it being His prerogative to baptize with the Holy Ghost, while His disciples did baptize with water. Jerusalem and Judea were the populous regions of the country. Jesus, as we see, preferred to keep this ministry somewhat unostentatious, as there was a probability of His being troubled by Herod, as John the Baptist had already been arrested; or, in case of excessive ado over Him, the multitude would very likely crown Him King, in which case the Romans would kill Him immediately as a rival of Caesar. Consequently, leaving Jerusalem and Judea, He goes away to the less populous regions of Galilee. “And it behooved Him to go through Samaria.” On the map you will see that Samaria reaches across Palestine, from the Jordan to the sea. Therefore the route from Judea into Galilee necessarily leads through Samaria, unless they go through Perea, thus crossing the Jordan twice. “Then He comes into a city of Samaria, called Sychar, near the land which Jacob gave to Joseph his son.” I traveled this same route during my late tour. It is about thirty miles. Sychar is synonymous with Shechem in the Old Testament, being quite a notable city, in the valley of Succoth, between Mt. Gerizim on the south and Mt. Ebai on the north, and situated on the old caravan road from Jerusalem to Damascus. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and other patriarchs and prophets, were all here frequently. When Jeroboam led off the ten tribes, he made this city his capital. Here Moses commanded six tribes to stand on Mt. Gerizim, and enunciate the blessings that would come to Israel in case of obedience; and the other six to stand on Mt. Ebal, and reiterate the curses destined to come upon Israel in case of disobedience. Before I went to these mountains and tested the matter, becoming acquainted with their amphitheatrical conformation, producing jointly a vast whispering-gallery, having the form of an ellipse, with two foci, and so constructed as to transmit sounds from one focus to the other, I used to wonder how six hundred thousand people could all intelligently bear the same utterances of the human voice. This city continued to be the capital during the reign of Jeroboam, his son Omri changing to the city of Samaria, twenty-five miles northeast. Though Reuben was Jacob’s firstborn, he forfeited the birthright — i.e. , a double portion of the patrimony — by his misconduct, Jacob taking it from him and giving it to Joseph, the first-born of Rachel, his favorite wife. For this reason, Joseph received two portions in the land of Canaan, which Joshua gave to his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, including this land of which we speak. “And there was the well of Jacob. Therefore Jesus, being weary of the journey, sat thus upon the well, and it was about the sixth hour.” O how I enjoyed my visit to Jacob’s Well as I knew I was then in the track of Jesus, for which privilege I traveled seventeen thousand miles; there never having been any dispute in reference to this location Hence, when pilgrims cross oceans and seas to walk in the track of the Savior, they all know they have achieved the end in view when they walk about Jacob’s Well. This well is seventy feet deep, and was doubtless considerably deeper in the days of our Savior, as Jacob dug it as a guarantee against a water-famine, lest in that delightful and fertile region, where springs abound, they may all go dry during the long summer droughts, and his herds and flocks famish for water. During the occupancy of the Holy Land by the Christian Crusaders, A.D. 1099 to A.D. 1187, they had a stone church-edifice over this well, which, after the conquests of Saladin, and the expulsion of the Crusaders from that country, was taken down, doubtless some of the stones being permitted to drop into the well, partially filling it up; so when I saw it, November, 1899, there was no water in it. The people said it had been dry but a short time, and, as the winter rains were even then beginning, they were looking for the water to come into it. Perhaps Jacob made it ninety to a hundred feet deep, finding there an inexhaustible perennial fountain. Here we read of Jesus being weary, but nowhere is it stated that He was ever sick; sickness being the result of sin, which He never had, and weariness only that of excessive toil. “The woman comes from Samaria to draw water. Jesus says to her, Give me to drink. For His disciples had gone away into the city, in order that they may purchase food. Then the Samaritan woman says to Him, How do you, being a Jew, ask to drink with me, being a Samaritan woman? for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.” When Shalmaneser, the Chaldean monarch, carried away Israel captive to Babylon, B.C. 721, leaving only a few very poor people in the land; as the years rolled on, and the wild beasts were about to take the country (of this you would not wonder, when they have so many hiding-places in the mountains), Esarhaddon, king of Babylon, sent people from different parts of his great heathen empire to come and inhabit the land, they being not only aliens, but idolaters. When Israel returned out of captivity, under Nehemiah, B.C. 490, and began to build the temple, these Samaritans, under the leadership of Sanballat, their governor, wanted to fall in as loyal Israelites, help to build the temple, and participate in the worship. On their rejection by Nehemiah and the elders of Israel as aliens and heathens, they became very mad, and did their utmost to defeat the building of the temple. This alienation developed into bitter antipathy, which was only intensified as the years rolled on. We are not to conclude that this woman was not willing to give Him a drink, but observing from His costume and physique that He is a Jew, she indulges in momentary tantalization; i.e. , “Though you Jews despise all of us Samaritans, yet now, that You are weary and thirsty, You will condescend to take a drink at the hands of a Samaritan woman. Jesus responded and said to her, If you knew the gift of God, and who is the One speaking to you, Give Me to drink, you would have asked Him, and He had given you living water.” Here we see the solution of the water-problem raised in the preceding chapter, “Born of water.” This woman thought He meant the water in the well, whereas He here perfectly relieves the matter, and solves the mystery, by telling her that He means “living water” — i.e. , the water of life. “The woman says to Him, Sir, You have no drawingrope, and the well is deep; whence then have You living water?” The disciples had gone on to the city a nearer way, doubtless carrying the rope with them, ready for use in this well or any other, as we see they bought their food and ate it at their own discretion, which is the current custom of that country at the present day, our party observing it. “Art Thou greater than our father Jacob, who gave to us the well, and he himself drank of it, and his sons and his herds?” You must remember that the Samaritans, though in the main aliens and heathens, and consequently reprobated by the Jews, claimed the bona fide lineage of the patriarchs, through those few Israelites who survived in the land after the Babylonian captivity. “Jesus responded and said, Every one drinking of this water, shall thirst again; but whosoever shall drink of the water which I will give unto him, shall never thirst; but the water which I will give unto him, shall be a fountain of water, springing up unto eternal life.” You see here that while the water in the well, which had to be drawn out, emblematizes regeneration, this springing water is an artesian well, which the Savior puts in the heart when He sanctifies us wholly. While running along through the Great American Desert, on my way to California, I look out and see a beautiful green farm, wrapped in verdant meadows, luxuriant gardens, prolific orchards, and fruitful fields. I wonder why this inspiring relief in the midst of the rainless, burning deserts. Now I see the problem solved.

There is an artesian well in the midst, pouring out a constant stream of water, about six inches in diameter, perennially, night and day, shooting up into the air, the excessive overflow forming a beautiful limpid lake, from which all that country is abundantly irrigated. The sanctified man has this artesian well in his soul, shooting up a living stream, night and day, wherever he goes. He has plenty for himself, and it is a joy in the community. “The woman says to Him, Sir, give to me this water, in order that I may not thirst, nor come hither to draw.” Occidental women have no conception of the toil endured by their Oriental sisters in carrying water from the fountains, frequently to a great distance, as this well is about a mile from the city. “Jesus says to her, Go, call your husband, and come hither.” Why this sudden transition of the subject? Jesus is a Model Preacher, and knows precisely how to do it. Your preaching will never be a success without true and radical conviction, which strikes deep into the heart, takes hold of the interior spirit, and never looses its grip. As Jesus knew all about her life, He here sends a thunderbolt into the secret citadel of her soul, going down and striking the taproot of that native evil, which had developed into her besetting sin. “The woman responded and said, I have no husband. Jesus says to her, You spoke truly, That I have no husband. For thou hast had five husbands, and the one whom thou now hast is not thy husband; thou hast spoken this truth.” This poor woman was a freelover, this being the grand citadel of her soul’s enemy. Jesus struck the great rock of her sinful nature in the center, the breakage radiating in all directions. Therefore He had a glorious case of lightning conviction. Lord, help us to preach like Thyself! I am an old revivalist, having been preaching forty-six years, and am now used of the Lord mainly on the teaching line. When I enjoyed my physical vigor, I never found a place where I couldn’t have a revival. I always began with the Sinai gospel, preaching for conviction till it came on my congregation like a nightmare from the eternal world. You see here that Jesus begins with conviction, adopting the only available method of securing it; i.e. , looking His auditor straight in the face, and telling her the blackest sin of her life. “The woman says to Him, Sir, I see that you are a prophet.” You see, conviction has already reached her, and this total Stranger, on whom she has been looking with the odium of a Jew, she now confesses to be a prophet of the Lord. “Our fathers worshipped in this mountain, and You say that Jerusalem is the place where it behooveth us to worship.” From the time Nehemiah and the elders at Jerusalem rejected the cooperation of Sanballat and the Samaritans, they had turned about and built a great and magnificent temple on Mt. Gerizim, as a rival of the temple on Mt. Moriah at Jerusalem.

When I was there, I climbed great Mt. Gerizim to its summit, visiting that temple, which is yet majestic, though in ruins. On the beautiful plateau surrounding that temple, the Samaritan millions were accustomed to gather and keep the Passover and other institutions of Moses. “Jesus says to her, Woman, believe Me, that the hour cometh when you will neither worship the Father in this mountain, nor at Jerusalem. You worship you know not what.” That was true, because their worship was really a mixture of Judaism and idolatry. “We worship what we know, because salvation is of the Jews;” i.e. , the Savior was to come of the Jews, and bring salvation to all the world. “But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshipers will wo