“Lo, the heavens were opened unto Him, and He saw the Spirit of God, descending like a dove, and lighting wpon Him.” Matt. 3:16. “And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee.” Luke 4:14.
“Make way!”
“Make way for the King!”
Clear, exultant voices ringing out on the Bethany road.
“T.o, He comes!”
“Martha! Rachel! Dorcas!
“Come! Come quickly! The Master rides this way!”
What a mixed and motley throng! What a colorful and cosmopolitan assemblage of rich and poor, old and young, must have lined the country roads to greet and cheer Him as He passed.
“Why make ye this ado?”
Dark-visaged Pharisees and Priests were there upon the fringes of the throng, moving like gathering stormclouds on the edge of the horizon.
“Know ye this man who calls himself the Christ and who rides unto the Holy City?”
“Know Him?”
“Indeed we know Him!”
“He is my Saviour!’ cries Zacchaeus.
“He is my Healer!” shouts Bartimaeus, delivered © from a life-long blindness.
“Me, He brought back from out the jaws of death!” answers Lazarus.
“He healed my child of lameness. Now she can run and need not fall.”’
“My son He healed of epilepsy. Oft he fell into the fire and into the flood. None could cure him; but the Christ laid His blessed hands upon him and he was of an instant delivered from the evil power which erstwhile had bound him.”
“T was a leper, shut out from home and friends! My abiding place was in the fields. But now I am made clean by the touch of His tender hand.”
What a galaxy must have assembled there that day to see the King ride by!
True, there was a shadow in His eyes and a tear upon His cheek for God-rejecting Israel. True, He was riding to His death — the shameful death upon the tree. But to those who greeted Him that day, He was “‘The Pearl of Great Price,”’ the ‘‘Light of the World,” the ‘‘Door of the Sheepfold.”’
Not because of them, but rather in spite of them, He was soon to be rushed to trial in the dead of night and hurried to the Tree, under armed Roman guards.
“Make way!’
“Make way for the King!”
On He rode, upon His humble mount.
Small wonder they brake branches from the palms and waved them in joyous praises as He passed. Small wonder they tore the garments from their shoulders and cast them to the earth that He might ride over the carpet of their prostrate wrappings.
* * Ox
Such were the closing scenes of a life of Spirit-filled ministry and supernatural power.
He the Shepherd — they the sheep.
He the Bread — they the hungry children.
He the Physician — they the ailing who had been made whole. .
They the troubled and perplexed — He the answer to all life’s pangs and questions.
Disgruntled Priests and Pharisees could not see it thus, and they mumbled in their beards.
What a stir He made within so short a time.
Like a flaming meteor that flashed athwart the stygian darkness of Idolatry and Unbelief, blazed its way across the midnight sky of Judah’s Ritualistic Formalism and soared into the light of coming dawn — so was the Spirit-filled ministry and life of Christ in Palestine.
Rending the veil of ceremony with His flaming, sword-like words, He revealed the shivering skeleton of Spiritual Death in the closet of cold professionalism, and pointed the way to living, vital relationship with God the Father.
In His wake He left a trail of consternated Priests, overturned money tables, a cleansed Temple, a multitude of rejoicing worshippers whom He had fed in soul and body, a path lined with discarded crutches and stretchers cast aside by sick folk made whole at His touch, radiant lives of sinners saved by grace, and a group of humble disciples, called from lowly walks of life, who vied with each other to catch up the _ silken banners of His truths and bear them through
flood and flame to the ends of the earth.
By what power had all these miracles been accom-
plished?
What was the secret of His marvelous hold upon the hearts of the people?
Clearly had He stated, in the hearing of them all:
“The words that I speak unto you, I speak not of myself; but He that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works.”
Motivated, actuated, enveloped by the power of the Holy Spirit sent down from the Father upon Him that memorable day on the banks of the Jordan, His every act was a revelation of the power of God. His every word was life and, as such, should never die.
Small wonder that the Scribes and Pharisees who sulked upon the borders of the crowd or sat scowling in the back seats of His congregation, were confounded by His words and deeds; by His remarkable effect upon the common people; by the utter invincibility which He presented to their sharp words and cunning attacks; and by that which was still more alarming, their own diminishing audiences and power.
How had He done these things?
How had they been accomplished?
Scribes of all ages have asked the same questions. They ask them still, today.
The marvelous promulgation of His Gospel and the absolute permanency of His work grows ever to be more and more the wonder of the world; for no other name than His has so endured.
Neros, with bleeding captives chained to crimsoned chariot wheels, have stormed and thundered their brief and fleeting way across the stage of life.
Caesars, with blare of trumpet and marching hordes have pomped and plumed their little day, and swept over the horizon to — oblivion.
Napoleons, hand on expanded chest, have strut
to across bleeding continents, seeking other worlds an-
at their Water loos, died in conquer; then fallen
of guished exile and been relegated to the shelves ancient history.
terror,
Czars have come, instituted their reigns of
luxreared their gilded palaces, lolled in sumptuous little ury and state, quaffed their wine, stood for their
; hour with mailed heel upon the neck of the oppressed ht. then been snuffed out like a candle ina cella r draug
d the
Kaisers, of our own fair age, have becloude
fields skies with smoke of battle and besmeared the y’s of Flanders with crimson, redde r than the popp
prickbloom. And yet, before our very eyes, as at the their
their glory die, ing of a bubble, we have seen
ted in top-most castles crumble; and themselves isola e fadet h some unpretentious spot. Even now the lustr
take their from their names, and they, forsooth, must yes-
ng place within the dusty archives of a moulderi teryear. Their sway is ended.
But Jesus! —
Ah! There’s a Name!
There’s a Name which, with every passing grows the brighter and glows the mightier .
His Name forgotten?
Never!
Today ’tis on the lips of unnumbered millions!
Mothers whisper it in benedictions o’er downy heads of drowsy babes.
Sufferers breathe it as they languish at Death’s drear portal.
Sinners sob it penitently at the foot of the Cross.
Saints shout it victoriously in ‘The Valley of the Shadow.”
The heathen hear it and are glad.
The toiler speaks it midst his labors, and is comforted.
It lives!
It thrills!
It thrives!
It grows!
The chorus of adoration of the Name of Jesus is ever expanding with the centuries, and it is blessed today around the earth.
But how came this state of affairs?
He had no armies.
He conquered no kingdoms.
No crown-jewels adorned His sacred brow.
No flaunting banners of earthly honor fluttered o’er His head.
He rode upon no silver-saddled steed.
No gilded chariots bore Him through the streets.
He left no book writ by His mortal hand. He wrote, rather, upon the tablets of the heart.
For a period of three and one-half short years, He walked among the sons of men and taught. And yet, in those brief months, His name, His words, and the spirit of His service were stamped indelibly, for all time, upon the granite cliffs of an unfading history!
He walked adown the sanded shores of Time, and all the raging waves of Atheism, Agnosticism, and Higher Criticism shall never —
Hear it, Voltaire!
Hear it, Payne!
Hear it, Darwin!
Hear it, Ingersoll and all your kind!
Hear it, Modernist!
Hear it, Teacher of Evolution!—
Shall never erase one sacred footprint from its place!
He left His voice within the waterfall.
He left His blood upon the rose.
Ascending, He laid His crimsoned hand upon the archway of the rainbow.
He intertwined His teaching, His redemptive plan, within the very warp and woof of life; and He has become the veritable Alpha and Omega of our existence.
His Gospel was not one of mere words. It was one of acts.
It was not one of mere theories. It was a definite, livable, underlying, question-answering, soul-satisfying, life-sustaining fact.
His Gospel not only showed His hearers their sins; but taught them how to become saints;
Not only showed the sick their affliction; but pointed the way to health;
Not only showed the church her emptiness; but revealed the bounteous store whereat she might replenish her oil.
He met the sinner and saved him.
He met the sick and healed him.
He met the demon-possessed and delivered him.
He met life’s problem an solved it.
Signs and wonders preceded Him.
Miracles attended Him.
The supernatural followed Him where’er He went.
Yet, though He was very God, and though all power was in His hand, He humbly but emphatically declared that the works which He wrought and the words which He spake were not of His own power or strength. He clearly stated that He Who dwelt within Him did the works.
Ah! There was the secret!
Think upon it, and consider it well!
Before the Lord Jesus preached a recorded sermon; before He enacted a recorded miracle; before He performed a recorded healing, He first received the Holy Spirit from on High.
Behold Him standing there! The dimpling waters of the Jordan rippling about Him.
The sheen of its multi-mirrors reflected upon His rae crystal drops like diamonds hanging in His ocks.
John, gazing raptly, wonderingly into His upturned face. The multitude standing motionless, almost breathless upon the shore, looking into His upraised eyes, or turning to follow the direction of His intent gaze. Then — Suddenly, the Light!
The Voice —
“This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
The very air athrob with the beating of invisible pinions.
And lo! The Spirit, as a Dove, descending and abiding upon Him!
Now the door of ministry is open!
Now the sick, the halt, the lame, the blind may cluster around and, touching the border of His seamless dress, be made every whit whole.
Now, words inspired of the living God flowing like
imrivers from His lips, carve their course upon the mortal tablets of the centuries.
He is filled with the Holy Ghost! He speaketh, not of Himself, but by the Spirit. The works which He
r now does, He does not of Himself; but by the powe of Him that dwelleth within Him.
Do you see it?
Do you understand?
Though He was the divine Son of the Living God,
with all full of grace and truth — yea, though vested
s power and authority under Heaven — the work Holy which He did were done by the powe r of the
gates of Spirit — the Spirit whose matchless flood blessing are still flung wide to the humb lest disciple.
Before His word, the ears of the deaf were stopped,
The tongue of the dumb was made to speak,
The lame leaped for joy,
The gates of the prison were opened wide,
The sinner found deliverance from his fetters,
The hungry found sustenance for his soul,
The billows ceased their raging and the storm put her hand over her mouth and was suddenly silent before His gentlest, ‘““Peace, be still!’’
His life was one succession of miracles and matchless manifestations of Divine Power, after the Holy Spirit came upon Him at the Jordan.
Though the enemy raged; though the Scribes and Pharisees slunk about the edges of the crowd and connived within themselves how best to confound and destroy Him; though Satan tempted; though His own familiar friend betrayed Him, He was filled with the Holy Ghost, and He moved steadily on!
Yet ever as He moved through the pages of the New Testament, and ever as He worked, the echo of His declaration rang clear: ‘He that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works.”
Tenderly, envelopingly, completely the life of the Son was wrapped up in the Holy Spirit. He, conceived of the Spirit, baptized with the Spirit, led of the Spirit, wrought His matchless works by the power of the Spirit.
When He departed this world, He left His disciples to carry on, bidding them do the works which He had done.
Does it stand to reason that He would call them to make bricks without straw, plant without rain, fight without a sword, bear water without a pitcher, give light without oil? Would He declare that His own works were done by the power of the Holy One that dwelt within Him, and then bid His disciples do the same work without that same power?
No! As Elijah’s mantle fell from his shoulders and was donned by the waiting disciple Elisha, so Christ, ascending up on High, sent down from the Throne of God the blessed Paraclete, the Dynamus of God, the energizing Executive, the life-giving Third Person of the blessed Trinity that He might abide within His disciples till He should come again, that they, too, might preach the Gospel of signs and wonders and be able to say as did their Master:
“He that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works.”