Matteo 4:1-25
1 Allora Gesù fu condotto dallo Spirito su nel deserto, per esser tentato dal diavolo.
2 E dopo che ebbe digiunato quaranta giorni e quaranta notti, alla fine ebbe fame.
3 E il tentatore, accostatosi, gli disse: Se tu sei Figliuol di Dio, di' che queste pietre divengan pani.
4 Ma egli rispondendo disse:
5 Allora il diavolo lo menò seco nella santa città e lo pose sul pinnacolo del tempio,
6 e gli disse: Se tu sei Figliuol di Dio, gettati giù; poiché sta scritto: Egli darà ordine di suoi angeli intorno a te, ed essi ti porteranno sulle loro mani, che talora tu non urti col piede contro una pietra.
7 Gesù gli disse:
8 Di nuovo il diavolo lo menò seco sopra un monte altissimo, e gli mostrò tutti i regni del mondo e la lor gloria, e gli disse:
9 Tutte queste cose io te le darò, se, prostrandoti, tu mi adori.
10 Allora Gesù gli disse:
11 Allora il diavolo lo lasciò; ed ecco degli angeli vennero a lui e lo servivano.
12 Or Gesù, avendo udito che Giovanni era stato messo in prigione, si ritirò in Galilea.
13 E, lasciata Nazaret, venne ad abitare in Capernaum, città sul mare, ai confini di Zabulon e di Neftali,
14 affinché si adempiesse quello ch'era stato detto dal profeta Isaia:
15 Il paese di Zabulon e il paese di Neftali, sulla via del mare, al di là del Giordano, la Galilea dei Gentili,
16 il popolo che giaceva nelle tenebre, ha veduto una gran luce; su quelli che giacevano nella contrada e nell'ombra della morte, una luce s'è levata.
17 Da quel tempo Gesù cominciò a predicare e a dire:
18 Or passeggiando lungo il mare della Galilea, egli vide due fratelli, Simone detto Pietro, e Andrea suo fratello, i quali gettavano la rete in mare; poiché erano pescatori.
19 E disse loro:
20 Ed essi, lasciate prontamente le reti, lo seguirono.
21 E passato più oltre, vide due altri fratelli, Giacomo di Zebedeo e Giovanni, suo fratello, i quali nella barca, con Zebedeo loro padre, rassettavano le reti; e li chiamò.
22 Ed essi, lasciata subito la barca e il padre loro, lo seguirono.
23 E Gesù andava attorno per tutta la Galilea, insegnando nelle loro sinagoghe e predicando l'evangelo del Regno, sanando ogni malattia ed ogni infermità fra il popolo.
24 E la sua fama si sparse per tutta la Siria; e gli recarono tutti i malati colpiti da varie infermità e da vari dolori, indemoniati, lunatici, paralitici; ed ei li guarì.
25 E grandi folle lo seguirono dalla Galilea e dalla Decapoli e da Gerusalemme e dalla Giudea e d'oltre il iordano.
ESPOSIZIONE
LA TENTAZIONE . L'accettazione da parte del Padre della consacrazione di sé da parte del Signore per l'opera del regno non esclude la tentazione, ma la rende necessaria. Psicologicamente, la reazione all'estasi di gioia nell'udire l'annuncio di Matteo 3:17 era certa; dal punto di vista etico, era auspicabile un test che accompagnasse la reazione.
Anche il Battista fu, come sembra, non senza una tentazione speciale durante questo periodo (cfr Giovanni 1:19 ; e la nota del vescovo Westcott). All'inizio stesso della sua vita ufficiale, il Signore è condotto coscientemente a rendersi conto di essere entrato in un cammino di completa fiducia (come i suoi fratelli nella carne, Ebrei 2:13 ) per tutte le necessità personali, un cammino che richiedeva grande calma e buon senso, e lungo il quale deve prendere i suoi ordini per la vittoria finale, non da principi mondani, ma direttamente da Dio.
In Luca l'ordine della seconda e della terza tentazione è invertito. Contro la supposizione di Godet ed Ellicott, che san Luca sia storicamente corretto, il "Vattene via Satana!" (versetto 10) sembra conclusivo. Ad ogni modo, per il fine di san Matteo in questo Vangelo la tentazione che egli pone al terzo è quella decisiva; il vero Re non adotterà un metodo irregolare per acquisire la sovranità.
poi ; temporale. Marco, "e subito". Subito dopo la discesa dello Spirito Santo su di lui. È stato condotto. nel deserto. Su (solo Matteo); dalla valle del Giordano all'altopiano tondo (cfr Giosuè 16:1 ), in questo caso nel deserto ( Matteo 3:1 ). Non ci è detto nulla per identificare il luogo, ma poiché la scena della tentazione doveva essere vicina alla scena del battesimo, cioè sul lato ovest del Giordano ( Matteo 3:1 , nota), potrebbe essere presumeva che la tentazione fosse anche sul lato occidentale.
L'aguzzo picco calcareo (Godet) conosciuto fin dalle Crociate come Quarantana, "dai quarantain, o quaranta giorni di digiuno", potrebbe, forse, essere stato il luogo vero e proprio. L'unica obiezione importante a questo è che subito dopo la tentazione (come sembra più probabile) viene da Giovanni in "Betania al di là del Giordano", Giovanni 1:28 (non necessariamente da identificare con "Bethabara" del testo ricevuto; la sua località è abbastanza sconosciuto).
Se fosse andato a est del Giordano dopo la tentazione, sarebbe ancora su una delle grandi strade per la Galilea ( Luca 9:52 , ecc.). La congettura che il digiuno e la tentazione abbiano avuto luogo sul Sinai è suggerita dall'analogia di Mosè ed Elia, ma da nulla nei Vangeli. Condotto dallo Spirito nel deserto; Marco, "lo Spirito lo sospinge"; Luca, "Gesù, pieno di Spirito Santo, tornò dal Giordano e fu condotto nello Spirito nel deserto" (con una guida che durò durante tutta la tentazione, ἤγετο … ἐν.
.. … αζόμενος). Senza dubbio egli stesso era incline ad andare in disparte nel deserto per poter meditare ininterrottamente sull'assicurazione appena data e sulle importanti questioni implicate nel suo battesimo; ma lo Spirito Santo aveva anche i suoi propositi con lui. Lo Spirito Santo non può, infatti, tentare, ma può e ci conduce in circostanze in cui la tentazione è consentita, affinché possiamo così essere provati e disciplinati per il lavoro futuro.
Nel caso di Cristo la tentazione è stata una parte importante di quella sofferenza morale dalla quale ha imparato la piena obbedienza ( Ebrei 5:8 ). Si noti che anche se l'espressione in Matteo 3:16 , "lo Spirito di Dio discendente", non va di per sé al di là delle espressioni dei maestri ebrei che negano la sua Personalità, sarebbe difficile trovare un'azione così personale come implica le parole "Gesù fu condotto dallo Spirito", attribuite allo Spirito negli scritti non cristiani.
Per Isaia 63:10 , Isaia 63:11 , Isaia 63:14 è molto meno definito, ei passaggi, ad esempio in Ezechiele 3:12 , si interpretano da Ezechiele 1:21 . Per lo stesso san Matteo la personalità dello Spirito Santo doveva, alla luce di Matteo 28:19 , essere un fatto certo.
Essere tentato dal diavolo . Quindi Luca; cioè il grande calunniatore, colui la cui caratteristica è la falsa accusa; ad es. contro gli uomini ( Apocalisse 12:10 ); contro Dio ( Genesi 3:1 ). Qui principalmente in quest'ultimo aspetto. Ognuna delle tre tentazioni, e sono tipiche di tutte le tentazioni; è principalmente una calunnia di Dio e dei suoi metodi.
Marco ha "di Satana", una parola ebraica equivalente a "avversario", che la LXX . quasi sempre rende da διαβάλλω, (confronta anche Numeri 22:22 , Numeri 22:32 ). Probabilmente al tempo della LXX . l'idea dello spirito maligno che accusa come in un tribunale, era più prominente del precedente pensiero di lui come avversario.
La resistenza spirituale dello spirito maligno a tutto il bene è un pensiero meno sviluppato del suo dedurre Dio all'uomo e, dopo un certo successo ottenuto, dedurre l'uomo a Dio. Il male può resistere al bene; può anche accusare sia Dio che quelli fatti a somiglianza di Dio.
And when he had fasted … he was afterwards an hungred. He was so absorbed in prayer that it was only after his six weeks meditation that he felt the need of food. But though his humanity had been elevated and his spiritual sense quickened by this at the time almost unconscious fast, it left him physically prostrate and completely exposed to attack. "In certain morbid conditions, which involve a more or less entire abstinence from food, a period of six weeks generally brings about a crisis, after which the demand for nourishment is renewed with extreme urgency.
The exhausted body becomes a prey to a deathly sinking. Such, doubtless, was the condition of Jesus; he felt himself dying. It was the moment the tempter had waited for to make his decisive assault" (Godet). Luke probably (though not in the Revised Version) represents the temptation as continuous during the whole period. Of this Matthew says nothing, but only describes the final scenes, when the might of the tempter was felt to the uttermost, and his defeat was most crucial.
Forty. Trench's remark is well worth study: "On a close examination we note it to be everywhere there [i.e. in Holy Scripture] the number or signature of penalty, of affliction, of the confession, or the punishment, of sin. Nights. The mention of nights as well as days brings out more vividly the continuance and the completeness of the abstinence (cf Genesi 7:4, Genesi 7:12 [17, LXX.
]; Esodo 24:18; Deuteronomio 9:1, especially Deuteronomio 9:18; 1 Re 19:8).
The tempter (1 Tessalonicesi 3:5 only; cf. 2 Corinzi 11:3). Came; came up to him (προσελθών). The word expresses local nearness, and suggests, though we cannot affirm it as certain, that he appeared visibly. The thought of physical nearness is continued in "taketh him" (Matteo 4:5, Matteo 4:8), and "the devil leaveth him" and "angels came near" (Matteo 4:11; cf.
Matteo 4:5, note). On the other hand, such expressions may be parabolic, and intended to express the closeness of the spiritual combat. To him; not after "came," but after "said" (Revised Version, with manuscripts). If thou be; art (Revised Version) (ει) … εἶ)—the "if" of assumption (cf. Colossesi 3:1). The devil does not attempt to throw doubt on the truth of the utterance in Matteo 3:17.
His words rather mean, "Thou knowest what was said, thou bast been gradually realizing that assurance of Sonship; use, then, that privilege which thou undoubtedly hast" (comp. Matteo 27:40, where, in mockery, the same truth is assumed). Wetstein, following Origen and pseudo-Ignatius,' Philipp.,' § 9, says that the tempter did not know, or at least doubted, whether Jesus was really God, for otherwise he would never have tempted him.
This is, surely, to miss the meaning of the temptation for our Lord himself; for he was tempted as Man. Satan might well haw known that he was God incarnate, and yet not have known whether as Man he might not yield. Weiss ('Life,' 1:343) mistakenly thinks that the object of this first temptation was to insinuate doubt in the mind of Jesus as to his Messiahship. "Command that these stones become bread, and if thou canst not do so, then thou art not the Son of God.
" Command that; εἰπὸν ἵνα (cf. Matteo 20:21, and Winer,§ 44:8). These stones, ie. lying about. Farrar suggests that there is a special reference to the "loaf-shaped fossils," septaria, which are found in Palestine—as, indeed, in most other countries. But though these "flattened nodules of calcareous clay, ironstone, or other matter" often assume fantastic shapes, perhaps even distantly resembling either an English loaf or a fiat Jewish cake (vide infra) , it seems quite unnecessary to see any allusion to them here.
(For the comparison of bread and a stone, cf. Matteo 7:9.) Be made; Revised Version, become; rightly, because there is no thought of the process of manufacture in γένωνται, Bread; Revised Version margin, "Greek, loaves" (ἄρτοι). "The Israelites made bread in the form of an oblong or round cake, as thick as one's thumb, and as large as a plate or Platter; hence it was not cut, but [e.
g. Matteo 1:1 Matteo 4:19] broken" (Thayer). In Luke the devil points to one stone only, and tempts him to bid it become a loaf.
It is written. Our Lord's three quotations are from Deuteronomio 8:3; Deuteronomio 6:16, Deuteronomio 6:13. Some portion of Deuteronomy (Matteo 6:4; Matteo 11:13, because included in the Sh'ma) was the first part of Scripture taught a Jewish child.
Possibly, though there is no evidence upon the subject, the neighbouring portions were often added. If they had been in our Lord's case, such a recurrence of them to his mind in his present state of exhaustion is in complete accord with psychological probability. Man … God (Deuteronomio 8:3, LXX.). As we could not accept Weiss's interpretation of the object of the devil's temptation, so neither can we accept his interpretation of our Lord's reply, that it is equivalent to "Not by means either natural or supernatural, is man's life really sustained, but by exact obedience to God's command.
" Our Lord quotes the passage in its primary meaning, which was fully applicable to the present occasion. It is equivalent to "Man lives, not necessarily by natural means, but by even supernatural means, if God so wishes." "The creative word, the ῥῆμα Θεοῦ, which alone imparts to the bread its sustaining power, can sustain, even as he is confident that in the present need it will sustain, apart from the bread".
The words of Deuteronomy are paraphrased in Wis. 16:26, where the author, in a thoroughly Jewish exposition, enumerates the lessons taught by the giving of the manna. "It was altered … that thy children, O Lord, whom thou lovest, might know that it is not the growing of fruits that nourisheth man; but that it is thy Word, which preserveth them that put their trust in thee." By every word.
Ἐπί (Textus Receptus; Westcott and Hort) is doubtless right. The alteration to ἐν (Lathmann, Tregelles) is probably due to a tendency towards the simple expression of means, but perhaps to the feeling that life, especially spiritual life, is maintained rather in a sphere than on a basis (cf. Romani 10:5; Galati 3:12).
Then the devil taketh him up. Revised Version omits "up." Matthew (παραλαμβάνει, here and verse 8) lays stress on the companionship, and, in a sense, compulsion; Luke (ἤγαγεν, verse 9; ἀναγαγὼν, verse 5), on guidance and locality. Into the holy city (Luke, "into Jerusalem"). From Isaia 52:1, the end of which verse, "There shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean," heightens the implied contrast of the devil's presence there.
(For the expression, cf. also Matteo 27:53; Apocalisse 11:2; Apocalisse 21:2,Apocalisse 21:10; also Ebrei 11:1.,Ebrei 11:12.) The name has remained down to the present day (El-Kuds).
And setteth; and he set (Revised Version, with manuscripts). The right reading (ἔστησεν, as in Luke) is probably a trace of the basis common to the two records. Possibly, however, it may here be a merely accidental similarity with Luke (who employs the aorist throughout the section), caused by Matthew's desire to emphasize the momentariness of the devil's act.
Some think that, as at the end of the temptation Christ is in the wilderness, this removal to Jerusalem is solely mental, without any motion of his body. Improbable; for to make such a temptation real, our Lord's mind must have suffered complete illusion. He must have thought that he was "on the pinnacle." On a (the, Revised Version) pinnacle of the temple (ἐπὶ τογιον τοῦ ἱεροῦ) What is exactly meant by this definite and evidently well-known term is not easy now to determine.
"Some understand this of the top or apex of the sanctuary (τοῦ ναοῦ) [cf. Hegesippus, in Eusebius, 'Hist. Eccl.,' Ecclesiaste 2:23 :11, Ecclesiaste 2:12 (Heinichen), where the Jews bid James stand, ἐπὶ τογιον τοῦ ἱεροῦ, and it is afterwards said that they set him ἐπὶ τογιον τοῦ ναοῦ]; others of the top of Solomon's porch; and others of the top of the Royal Portico" (Thayer).
Of this last Josephus ('Ant.,' 15.11. 5) makes special mention, saying, in his exaggerated style, that human sight could not reach from the top of it to the bottom of the ravine on whose edge it stood. Edersheim ('Life,' etc., 1:303) thinks that possibly the term means "the extreme corner of the 'wing-like' porch, or ulam, which led into the Sanctuary." This last would suit a possible interpretation of Daniele 9:27, as referring to a part of the temple under the name of "the pinnacle," which had been used for heathen sacrifices, probably in the worship of the sun. Cf. Revised Version margin there, with the ἐπὶ τον of Theodotion's version, and also the LXX. itself (vide Field's 'Hexapla').
If thou be the Son of God (Matteo 4:3, note). For it is written. Salmi 91:11,Salmi 91:12, verbally from the LXX., but omitting the clause, "to keep thee in all thy ways." Luke omits only "in all thy ways." The clause, according to either record, was omitted possibly because the devil shrank from reminding Jesus of "ways" which he need not take; more probably because ' ways" hardly fitted this case (cf.
Weiss). Trench, following St. Bernard, says that the omission of the clause alters the whole character of the quotation, considering that "ways" implies ways appointed by God. But this appears to be strained. The devil, appealing to Jesus' consciousness of abiding communion with God (Salmi 91:1), bids him enjoy to the full the promise of God's protection. There is no thought here of a "miracle of display" to the multitudes who were assembled, "as a matter of course," on the temple area (Meyer; cf.
even Trench). Neither the devil's solicitation nor our Lord's reply hint at anything else than Divine protection. If it be urged that for this any one of the many precipices by the Dead Sea, e.g. those of the Quamntana (verse 1, note) itself, would have been sufficient, the answer may be found in the fact that at the temple, the seat of God's special manifestation, God's special protection might be looked for.
There is a slight doubt whether the ὅτι after γέγραπται is recitative (Westcott and Hort, and most) or part of the quotation (Rheims, Meyer, Weiss). In favour of the latter view is the fact that the recitative ὅτι is not used elsewhere in this section (verses 4, 7, 10), but as in Luca 4:10 it can hardly be other than recitative (for another ὅτι is inserted before "on their hands"), the probability is that it was recitative in the oral source, and therefore recitative here.
In their hands; Revised Version, on; ἐπὶ χειρῶν. The thought is not so much of surrounding care as of physical support through space. Lest at any time; Revised Version, lest haply; and so always, for "in the New Testament use of rids particle (μή ποτέ) the notion of time usual to ποτέ seems to recede before that of contingency" (Thayer).
It is written again; i.e. in addition, not to our Lord's previous quotation (Matteo 4:4), in which case we should expect to lind πάλιν in Matteo 4:10, but to the devil's appeal to Scripture. Bengel, "Scriptura per Scripturam interpretanda et concilianda". Thou shalt not tempt (Deuteronomio 6:16, verbally from the LXX.
, and equivalent to the Hebrew, except that the Hebrew verb is in the plural). In Deuteronomy the sentence continues, "as ye tempted him in Massah;" i.e. ye shall not test the reality of his presence and the greatness of his power as ye did (Esodo 17:1) at Rephidim. The act proposed to our Lord would have been precisely parallel to that sin of old (cf.
Judith's words to the people of Bethulia that, by fixing a limit of days for God to deliver them, they in reality tempted God [ἐπειράσατε τὸν Θεόν] Judith 8:12: cf. also Salmi 78:41). "In this refusal of Christ's are implicitly condemned all who run before they are sent, who thrust themselves into perils to which they are not called; all who would fain be reformers, but whom God has not raised up and equipped for the work of reformation; and who therefore for the most part bring themselves and their cause together to shame, dishonour, and defeat; with all those who presumptuously draw drafts on the faithfulness of God, which they have no scriptural warrant to justify them in believing that He will honour".
Into an exceeding high mountain (εἰς ὄρος ὑψηλὸν λίαν; cf. Ezechiele 40:2; Apocalisse 21:10). Not in Luke. While no material mountain would have enabled our Lord to see all the kingdoms, etc., with his bodily eyes, it is probable that the physical elevation and distance of landscape would psychologically help such a vision.
The Quarantana, which "commands a noble prospect", may have been the spot. In the case of Ezekiel it is expressly said that his being "brought into the land of Israel, and set upon a very high mountain," was only "in the visions of God." All the kingdoms of the world (τοῦ κόσμου; but Luke, τῆς ρἰκουμένηςs, i.e. of the whole world as occupied by man, cf.
Bishop Westcott on Ebrei 2:5). Cyrus says (Esdra 1:2), "All the kingdoms of the earth hath the Lord, the God of heaven, given me." And the glory of them'; "i.e. their resources, wealth, the magnificence and greatness of their cities, their fertile lands, their thronging population" (Thayer); cf. Matteo 6:29; Apocalisse 21:24, Apocalisse 21:26.
The kingdoms themselves and their outward show. Contrast the words of the seraphim, "The whole earth is full of his glory" (Isaia 6:3). In Luke this expression does not occur at this point, but in the tempter's words. As it there comes more abruptly, that is perhaps the more original position. St. Luke adds, "In a moment of time."
All these things will I give thee (ταῦτά σοι πάντα δώσω). The devil puts "these things" and "thee" in the sharpest contrast. In Luke the devil says, "To thee will I give all this authority, and the glory of them: for it [i.e. the authority] hath been delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it;" i.e. there the devil speaks of giving, not actual possession of the things themselves (Matthew), but the authority that this implied, "and the glory of them.
" According to St. Luke, he does not attempt to conceal the fact that he has not absolute possession, but he claims authority as delegated to him, and as capable of being delegated by him to another. His claim was false as absolutely stated, but is true relatively in so far that even his usurpation of power must have been permitted (of. our Lord's term for him, "The prince of this world"). If thou wilt fall down and worship me; i.
e. prostrate thyself in obeisance before me—the Eastern method of acknowledging the superiority of a person (cf. Genesi 23:7; 1Sa 20:41; 2 Samuele 1:2; 2 Samuele 9:6). The expression does not mean "worship me as God" (for this surely was far too coarse a temptation to overcome any even ordinarily pious Israelite; cf.
Weiss), but "acknowledge my rights as over-lord." It is not a question of apostasy (1 Re 18:21; cf. Giosuè 24:15), but of submission to the methods inculcated by Satan, which placed the immediate and the visible above the future and the unseen (Genesi 3:5; Esodo 32:4).
Get thee hence, Satan. "Avaunt, Satan" (Rheims). Christ does not address him.directly till this climax. The two previous temptations were, comparatively speaking, ordinary and limited. This temptation calls out a passionate utterance of a personality stirred, because touched, in its depths. Only once again do we find our Lord so moved, in Matteo 16:23 (the "Western" and "Syrian" addition here of ὀπίσω μου from that passage emphasizes the feeling common to the two cases), when a similar representation is made to him that he ought to escape the troubles which his Messianic position, in fact, brought upon him. For it is written (Deuteronomio 6:13); from the LXX., which differs from the Hebrew by
(1) translating ארית, "fear," by προσκυνήσεις (but B has φοβηθήσῃ); and
(2) the paraphrastic insertion of "only." Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. Worship; προσκυνέω) , as in Matteo 16:9. Serve; λατρεύω, "in perfect subjection to a sovereign power" (Bishop Westcott on Ebrei 8:2, Add. Note).
Our Lord's reply cuts up the devil's solicitation by the root. "I do not enter," he means, "into the question of thy authority over these things, and of thy power concerning them. I acknowledge thee not. The command which I willingly obey excludes all homage and service to any other over-lord than God alone. I accept not thy orders and thy methods. I take my commands direct from God." Observe that our Lord does not say how he is to gain the kingdoms for his own; this would be the care of him whose command he follows.
But before ascending, the Lord proclaimed (Matteo 28:18) that he had received (i.e. gained through suffering, Ebrei 2:10 : Filippesi 2:9) more than (note "in heaven") what the devil would have given him as a reward of obedience to false principles.
The devil leaveth him; Luke, "departed from him for a season." For though there are crises of temptation, the devil never finally gives up his attack while the object of it is still on earth. May not even direct assaults be included in the remarkable epitome of Messianic life found in Luca 22:28? And, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.
Kept back before both by the presence of the evil one, and by the need for the God-Man to contend alone, they now came up to him and ministered to him so long as they could be helpful (for the change of tenses, cf. Matteo 8:15). Mark however (Marco 1:13) implies that they had been present at other times than after this last crisis.
Ministered; possibly supplying his bodily need (cf. Matteo 8:15; Luca 10:40); but as, after all, bodily sustenance is but secondary to spiritual, the latter must at least be included (cf. Ebrei 1:14). In Luca 22:43 the "strengthening" would appear to be of his whole nature within and without, through the medium of his spirit.
JESUS' WITHDRAWAL INTO GALILEE. According to some commentators, a new section begins here; but probably these verses are still preliminary. Our Lord's activity does not begin till Matteo 4:17. But now he withdraws to Galilee, settling in Capernaum, thus fulfilling prophecy.
Now when Jesus had heard. If we had the synoptic Gospels alone, we should have supposed that the Baptist was imprisoned immediately after the end of our Lord's temptation (cf. this verse with Luca 4:14); but St. John (Giovanni 3:24) expressly states that he had not been cast into prison when the events recorded in Giovanni 1:43 took place.
"For a time Christ and the Baptist worked side by side, preaching ' repentance' (Marco 1:15 [also Matteo 4:17]) and baptizing [Giovanni 3:22]. The Messiah took up the position of a prophet in Judaea, as afterwards in Galilee" (Bishop Westcott, on Giovanni 3:22).
The events in Galilee related in Giovanni 2:1 were "preparatory to the manifestation at Jerusalem which was the real commencement of Christ's Messianic work. St. John records the course and issue of this manifestation: the other Evangelists start with the record of the Galilaean ministry, which dates from the imprisonment of the Baptist" (Bishop Westcott, on Giovanni 3:24).
He adds, on Giovanni 4:43, "It seems probable that the earlier part of the synoptic narratives (Marco 1:14, and parallels) must be placed in the interval which extended from Giovanni 4:43." Matthew alone states directly that the news of the Baptist having been taken by Herod was the motive of our Lord's withdrawal into Galilee.
He says nothing to show whether our Lord withdrew because he would avoid a like treatment himself, or, as is on the whole more likely, because he did not wish to be mixed up in the tumults to which John's capture appears to have given rise (cf. Matteo 14:5). Was cast into prison; "was delivered up"; παρεδόθη, absolutely. If the more proper meaning of the word may be insisted on, the thought is of the person to whom John was committed rather than of the place; John being delivered up, that is to say, by Herod to his officials.
But in usage it appears rather to mean only compulsory removal, loss of liberty. Mark points out the temporary protection that the imprisonment gave to John against the resentment of Herodias. He departed; Revised Version, he withdrew; ἀνεχώρησεν,. A favourite word of St. Matthew's. It always implies some motive for the change of place, and is frequently used of departure directly consequent upon knowledge acquired.
Hence it often implies a feeling of danger. Into Galilee; whence he had come (Matteo 3:13). Hence "returned" (Luke). In Galilee he would still be in Herod's dominions; but, as being in his own home, he would not attract so much attention. N.B.—Between verses 12 and 13 some place the incident of his preaching at Nazareth (Luca 4:16); but verse 23 of that passage assumes much previous work at Capernaum, and can therefore hardly be as early as this.
And leaving Nazareth. Finally as a place of residence. The form Ναζαρά occurs only here and Luca 4:16, which in itself well suits the opinion that Luca 4:16 is only a fuller account of this sojourn at Nazareth (cf. Weiss, ' Matthaus-Evang.'). He came and dwelt; i.e. made his home in (cf.
Matteo 2:23). Not as having a house of his own there, so that he could take shelter in it as of right (cf. Matteo 8:20, "The foxes have holes," etc.); but probably settling his mother there, and being himself generally admitted to some one's house (perhaps Peter's, cf. Matteo 8:14, Matteo 8:16) when he came to the town.
In Capernaum. Most probably the modern Tell-hum, upon the north-western shore, two miles from where the Jordan enters the lake. On the interesting relic of the synagogue, presumably that built by the centurion (Luca 7:5), vide especially Bishop Westcott on Giovanni 6:59. The identification with Tell-Hum can, however, hardly be considered as absolutely settled.
"Some of the narratives of pilgrims of the sixth and seventh centuries appear to place Capernaum here. Jewish authors mention a place called Karat Tankhum, or Nakhum; and as the Arabic Tell ("hill") might easily be substituted for the word Kaphar ("village"), and Nakhum corrupted to Hum, Capernaum and Tell-Hum may be identical. On the other hand, Sepp supposes that the name of the Minim (Jewish Christians), who are known to have been numerous at Capernaum down to the time of Constantine, has been preserved in the Khan Minyeh".
Which is upon the sea coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim. The details are mentioned to show the accordance with the following prophecy. Neubauer points out that, according to Giosuè 19:33, Giosuè 19:34, and the notices in the Talmud, the whole western side of the lake was in Naphtali, and that hence Capernaum could not, strictly speaking, be "in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim.
" He himself explains the discrepancy by saying that St. Matthew imitates the Haggadistic methods in accommodating the geography to the text he quotes. But it is clear that the expression is satisfied by the fact that Zebulun was really near Capernaum, and that numbers of those who frequented the town must have come from Zebulun. The position of Capernaum thus formed quite a sufficient reason for quoting the prophecy in Isaiah.
Our evangelist, who (Isaia 2:1.) had noticed the coining of distant heathen to worship Messiah, though he was persecuted by the then ruler of the nation, found it very significant that his public activity should begin at a distance from the home of the hierarchy, and in a district which had been the first to suffer from heathen attacks in the past, and had at the present moment a population in which there was a great mixture of the heathen element (cf. Weiss, 'Matthiaus-Evang.').
The land of Zabulon, etc. From Isaia 9:1, Isaia 9:2, spoiled in the Authorized Version, but rendered correctly in the Revised Version. Isaiah says that those parts of the land which had borne the first brunt of the Assyrian invasions under Tiglath-Pileser (2 Re 15:29; el. Zaccaria 10:10), shall be proportionately glorified by the advent of Messiah.
Wetstein gives a tradition from the 'Pesikt. Zut.,' of Messiah ben Joseph first appearing in Galilee; hut the whole passage clearly points to a knowledge of the New Testament. As to the form of the quotation, observe:
(1) Matthew disregards the Hebrew construction, and gives merely the general sense.
(2) He takes it from the Hebrew, not the LXX.
(3) This last point is doubtless to be connected with the fact that the quotation does not occur in the other Gospels, i.e. that it did not belong to the Petrine cycle of teaching, and if it did belong to the "Matthean" cycle, not to that form which was current among Gentile Christians. Zabulon and … Nephthalim, equivalent to the later Upper and Lower Galilee.
By the way of the sea; toward the sea (Revised Version); cf. Geremia 2:18; "i.e. the district on the W. of the Sea of Galilee, as opposed to 'the other side of Jordan,' and 'the circle of the nations,' i.e. the frontier districts nearest to Phoenicia, including 'the land of Cabul' (1 Re 9:11), which formed part of the later Upper Galilee.
Via Marls, M. Renan observes, was the name of the high road from Acre to Damascus, as late as the Crusades. 'Way,' however, here means 'region' (cf. Isaia 58:12; Giobbe 24:4)" (Cheyne, on Isaia 9:1). Yet hardly so; ὁδόν, is adverbial, 1 Re 8:48 (equivalent to 2 Cronache 6:38), and designates the stretching of the districts of Zebulun and Naphtali towards the sea.
The sea is the Sea of Galilee. The close union of this clause in the Authorized Version with the following words, "beyond Jordan," misses its true meaning as explanatory of the position of Zebulun and Naphtali, and rather takes it as describing some special locality east of Jordan. Beyond Jordan; i.e. the eastern side, mentioned in 2 Re 15:29 as having suffered with Naphtali under the Assyrian invasion; see further 2 Re 15:25. Galilee of the Gentiles (vide supra, "by the way of the sea").
The people which sat; "who walk" (Hebrew). Saw great light; saw a great light (Revised Version); unnecessarily except as a matter of English, for it can hardly mean a definite light, Messiah. Φῶς both here and in the next clause means light as such. And to them which sat. So the Hebrew, but the LXX. generally οἱκατοικοῦντες.
In the region and shadow of death. The region where death abides, and where it casts its thickest shade. The Hebrew is simply "in the land of the shadow of death" (תומלץ צראב, according to the traditional interpretation), which the present LXX. (Vatican) probably represents (ἐν χώρᾳ σκιᾷ θανάτου) , the ς of σκιᾶς having been misread before θ.
But copyists, not understanding this, inserted καὶ between χώρᾳ and σκιᾷ (as in A), and this reading became popularly known, and was used by the evangelist. That the reading of A was derived from the evangelist is unlikely, for the reading σκιᾷ must, at all events, have been before his time. Light is sprung up; to them, did light spring up (Revised Version); ἀνέτειλεν.
The tense emphasizes not the abiding effect (e.g. in the fact that so many of the disciples were Galilaeans), but the moment of his appearance. The father of the Baptist also remembered this passage of Isaiah (Luca 1:78, Luca 1:79, where cf. Godet).
THE FIRST STAGE OF CHRIST'S WORK AND TEACHING.
The proclamation. From that time; ἀπὸ τότε (elsewhere in the New Testament only Matteo 16:21; Matteo 26:16; Luca 16:16); i.e. from the time of his residence in Capernaum (Matteo 4:13). Apparently our Lord, after the baptism, went to John (vide supra, verse 1), then retired to Galilee, going first to Nazareth, then finally leaving it as his home for Capernaum.
At Caper-nauru his public activity begins. From that time; the phrase expresses not merely "at that time," but "from that time," as the starting-point. Henceforth this was to be his message, even though its form might be altered. The phrase marks, as in Matteo 16:21, the commencement of a new stage in his life. His earlier work with John the Baptist is not included in the oral Gospel, probably because the twelve were not yet joined to him in formal and continuous adhesion.
Repent, etc. His words are exactly the same as the Baptist's (Matteo 3:2), with whom, indeed, he had been very lately associated. There is no evidence that he meant by them anything else than the Baptist meant. It is very intelligible that quite early (Old Syriac) an attempt should be made to harmonize this summary of his preaching rather with that of his disciples (Matteo 10:7).
The summons to help in his work: his first formal adherents. On the relation of this call to the meeting with Andrew and Peter, recorded in Giovanni 1:40, vide especially Bishop Westcott there. That was "the establishment of a personal relationship;" this "a call to an official work."
And Jesus, walking. Revised Version rightly omits "Jesus," and inserts "he" before "saw." The right reading does not detract so much from the emphatic statement of Matteo 4:17. By the Sea of Galilee. His walk lay along the lake. Socin speaks of "the probability that there was a frequented road from the mouth of the Jordan skirting the bank of the lake.
" Two brethren, Simon … and Andrew his brother; the addition, "his brother," emphasizing the relationship. Christ's coming would divide households (Matteo 10:21). He would, therefore, be the more glad when members of one family united in following him. Simon, etc. (vide Matteo 10:2, note). Called; Revised Version, who is called; i.
e. not specially by Christ, but in common usage among Christians (Matteo 10:2). Casting a net; βάλλοντας ἀμφίβληστρον (no var. lect.). Probably later than and explanatory of the form found in the parallel passage, Marco 1:16, ἀμφιβάλλοντας (alone).
A net; i.e. a casting-net of circular, bell-like shape, "which, when skilfully cast from over the shoulder by one standing on the shore or in a boat, spreads out into a circle (ἀμφιβάλλεται) as it falls upon the water, and then, sinking swiftly by the weight of the leads attached to it, encloses whatever is below it" (Trench, 'Syn.,' § 64.). It specializes δίκτυον, and differs from σαγήνη (the long draw-net, Matteo 13:47).
Follow me; come ye after me (Revised Version); δεῦτε ὀπίσω μου. There is no thought of continuous following from place to place (ἀκολουθεῖν) , but of immediate detachment from the present sphere of their interest and of attachment to Jesus as their leader. And I will make you fishers of men; Mark, "to become fishers of men," laying more stress on the change in their character necessary for success in this new kind of fishing.
Luca 5:10 brings out the change in the nature of the work(ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν). Fishers. The word suggests care, patience, skill, besides habits of life fitted for endurance of privation and fatigue. The same promise is, as it seems, related in Luca 5:10, where notice:
(1) It is connected with the miracle of the draught of fishes.
(2) It is not verbally identical with this: Μὴ φοβοῦ ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν ἀνθρώπους ἔσῃ ζωγρῶν.
(3) The words are addressed individually to Simon.
And they straightway left their nets. (For their leaving everything Wetstein, on Matteo 4:19, compares Epictetus, 12, Ἐάν δὲ κυβερνήτης καλέσῃ τρέχε ἐπὶ τὸ πλοῖον ἀφεὶς ἐκεῖνα πάντα μηδὲν ἐπιστρεφόμενος, "If the steersman call, run to the ship, leaving all those things, without regarding anything.") The Rheims Version, with its love of archaisms, has, "But they incontinent, leaving the nettes, followed him."
Other two brethren (cf. Matteo 4:18, note); in Matthew only. James the son of Zebedee. Why is the father of Peter and Andrew never mentioned, save incidentally, and by our Lord (Matteo 16:17; Giovanni 1:42; Giovanni 21:15)? Probably Zebedee and his wife Salome became, unlike Peter's parents, well-known believerses It may be that Peter was the eldest of the Twelve, and that his father was already dead or, though perhaps believing on Jesus, was too old to take any special part in the work.
Luke (Luca 5:10) adds, "Who were partners with Simon"—an item of information perhaps obtained from the same source as his first and second chapters. In a ship; in the boot (Revised Version), and so always in the Gospels. The word (πλοῖον) may be used of any sized vessel (equivalent to "large ship ' in Atti degli Apostoli 27:1.
), but here, as managed by so few men, it is equivalent to "boat." Other words translated "boat" in the New Testament are πλοιάριον, "little boat" (Mark once, John four times), and σκάφη, "small ship's boat" (Atti degli Apostoli 27:16, Atti degli Apostoli 27:30, Atti degli Apostoli 27:32). Josephus says ('Bell.
Jud.,' Luca 2:21.Luca 2:8) that when he gathered all the boats on the lake to attack Tiberius, there were "not more than four sailors in each;" by which he probably means, not the number of men wherewith he was able to equip them, but the number he found already managing them. With Zebedee their father. In Matthew only.
Mending their nets. The first pair of brothers were in the excitement of catching; the second had perhaps caught, and were mending their nets with a view to a fresh attempt; in neither case was there a moment's delay. And he called them. This time his words are not given.
Left the ship and their father, and followed him (ἠκολούθησαν αὐτῷ) St. Matthew emphasizes the facts that they left both natural relations and means of livelihood, and that here their continuous following of Christ began. St. Mark rather lay stress on their leaving the old life (ἀπῆλθον ὀπίσω αὐτοῦ)
The firstfruits of popular enthusiasm. As on Christ's call a few followed him (Matteo 4:20), so after his circuit in Galilee did crowds, from all parts of the Holy Land, also follow him (Matteo 4:25), though less immediately and devotedly. As to these verses (23-25), notice—
(1) Nearly all Matteo 4:23 recurs in Matteo 9:35.
(2) Matteo 9:24, Matteo 9:25 occur in the parallels in different connexions. St. Mark places them in Matteo 3:7, Matteo 3:8, after he has recorded details of many miracles which are found later in Matthew. St. Luke places them in Matteo 6:17, Matteo 6:18, immediately before the sermon on the mount (as in Matthew), but after the call of the Twelve.
(3) St. Matthew, therefore, did not arrange his Gospel with a sole regard to chronology.
(4) The verses are clearly a summary of our Lord's work and influence in the early part of his ministry.
(5) Weiss ('Manual,' 2.277, etc.) considers that verses 23 and 24 are a heading to the description of the teaching and healing activity of Jesus (Matteo 4:25), and that the repetition of verse 23 in Matteo 9:35 marks the heading of the next section (Matteo 9:36).
It is, indeed, remarkable that in Matteo 9:35 it occurs just before the definite setting apart of the twelve, and again that the phrase, "And seeing the multitudes," is found both in Matteo 5:1 and in Matteo 9:36. Possibly the saying was part of the original setting of the two discourses, ch. 5-7 and Matteo 10:1.
And Jesus went about all Galilee; in all Galilee (Revised Version, with the manuscripts). This indicates, not so much systematic itineration round the cities in order (contrast the simple accusative in Matteo 9:35 [Marco 6:6]; 23. 15), as going hither and thither among them (cf. Atti degli Apostoli 13:11).
All (Matteo 8:34, note). Teaching … preaching … healing. Our Lord, unlike the Baptist, takes men as and where he can find them; the religious, by teaching in the synagogues; the mass of people, by preaching, presumably in public places; the sick, by healing them wherever they are brought to him. Notice the threefold cord of all Christ-like ministry—teaching, especially those who have desires heavenwards; preaching, especially to the unconverted; healing, which cares for all physical life.
Synagogues. "The synagogues were places of assembly for public worship, where on sabbaths and feast-days (at a later period, also on the second and fifth days of the week) the people met together for prayer, and to listen to the reading of portions of the Old Testament, which were translated and explained in the vernacular dialect. With the permission of the president, any one who was fitted might deliver addresses" (Meyer).
The gospel. The first time it occurs in the text of St. Matthew. Of the kingdom. The phrase is used thus absolutely only elsewhere in Matteo 9:35 and Matteo 24:14 (Marco 1:15 is a false reading). This expression (with Matteo 24:17, "Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand") is the earliest form of the message.
The good news centred in the kingdom, i.e. the realization of the position accepted by the nation at Sinai, with all that that involved,. The phrase, "the gospel of the kingdom," refers only to the blessedness of its approach, and says nothing (unlike Matteo 24:17)of the preparation for it. Healing (θεραπεύων). As compared with ἰάομαι (rare in Matthew, in the active only Matteo 13:15, which is from the LXX.
, but frequent in Luke) θεραπεύω thinks rather of the healer, who renders the service; ἰάομαι, rather of the healed, the completeness of the cure (cf. Matteo 8:7, Matteo 8:8), Sickness; disease, Revised Version; νόσον, laying stress on the pain and disorder. Disease; sickness, Revised Version; μαλακίαν, laying stress on the weakness.
(For the two words in combination, cf. Deuteronomio 7:15.) Among the people (ἐν τῷ λαῷ). These words are wanting in the true text of Matteo 9:35. The people; i.e. the Jews, as contrasted with those included in Matteo 9:24. Not that St. Matthew means to exclude any sick Gentile who happened to be living among the Jews; but in this verse he is thinking only of those who lived near, and he naturally uses the word which connotes the Jewish people. If others came, it was only because they lived ἐν τῷ λαῷ.
And his fame; Revised Version, and the report of him (ἡἀκοὴ αὐτοῦ). Our use of the word "fame" implies reputation and honour, which are not included under ἀκοή. Went throughout all (Matteo 4:23) Syria; Revised Version, went forth into; ἀπῆλθεν εἰς.
The expression not merely means that the report spread far and wide, but that it went beyond the expected limits of the Holy Land into the whole of Syria, i.e., probably, the Roman province with which Palestine was in some degree (Schurer, 1.2.46) incorporated. All sick people that were taken with divers diseases; Revised Version, grammatically, all that were sick, holden with, etc.
Possibly, "all that were sick" is the genus of which the following expressions represent species; but Matteo 8:16 and Marco 1:32 suggest that the words all to diseases refer to bodily diseases only. The arrangement would then be
(1) bodily diseases,
(a) ordinary (ποικίλαις νόσοις),
(b) violent and painful eases (βασάνοις);
(2) mental diseases,
(a) supernatural,
(b) natural;
(3) incurable, affecting the body also. And those which were possessed with devils. Weiss, 'Life,' 2. pp. 76-88 (especially against Meyer), points out that our Lord shared the belief in the reality of possession by evil spirits, and that therefore, though some of the current ideas may have been superstitious, there must have been a basis of truth in the belief. See by all means Trench on the healing of the Gadarene demoniacs (Matteo 8:28).
And those which were lunatick; Revised Version, and epileptic —"epilepsy being supposed to return and increase with the increase of the moon" (Thayer, s.v. σεληνιάζεσθαι which occurs in the New Testament only here and in Matteo 17:15).
The mention of the multitudes here serves as a transition to the sermon on the mount. The description of the con stituent paris of the multitudes is very similar to that found in Marco 3:7, Marco 3:8, and is probably derived from the same source, Mark preserving in most respects the fuller form. Great multitudes; ὄχλοι πολλοί (not "many multitudes," but as plural of ὄχλος πολύς, Matteo 20:29); almost (Luca 5:15) peculiar to this Gospel (Matteo 8:1, where see note [18, Received Text; Matteo 12:15, Received Text]; Matteo 13:2; Matteo 15:30; Matteo 19:2).
Decapolis. A kind of confederacy, originally of ten towns, the organization being apparently the work of Pompey. All were east of Jordan except Bethshan (Scythopolis). The names, as given in Pliny, are—Damascus, Philadelphia, Raphana, Scythopolis, Gadara, Hippus, Dium, Pella, Galasa (read Gerasa) , Kanatha. Schurer adds, Abila (not Abila of Lysanias) and Kanata (distinct from Kanatha) These towns, like the great maritime cities, e.
g. Joppa, and Caesarea Stratonis, were independent political communities, which—at least, after the time of Pompey—were never internally blended into an organic unity with the Jewish region, but were at most externally united with it under the same ruler". The population in them was chiefly heathen. Across Jordan; equivalent to Peraea, as in verse 15 and Matteo 19:1, i.
e. from Mount Hermon to the river Arnon (Weiss-Meyer); but according to Josephus ('Bell. Jud.,' Matteo 3:3. Matteo 3:3), between the rivers Jabbok and Amen (Alford). "The country east of Jordan was known as Peraea (the country beyond) in the wider sense, but Peraea proper was the small district extending from the river Amen (Mojib) to the Zerka, and now called Belka". To the places mentioned here as those whence people came, Mark adds Idumaea; Mark and Luke add Tyre and Sidon.
HOMILETICS
The temptation of Christ.
I. THE PREPARATION,
1. The Spirit. He was "full of the Holy Ghost" (Luca 4:1). The Spirit had descended from heaven like a dove, and abode upon him. He was now in the full consciousness of his Divine mission. His sacred human nature was filled through and through with the abiding presence of the Holy Ghost: "God gave not the Spirit by measure unto him" (Giovanni 3:34).
His holy soul must have glowed with a deep, heavenly joy in ineffable communion with the Father, in the calm contemplation of the blessed work which lay before him. He had hitherto led a quiet life; he had wrought no mighty works; he had not taught, save by the silent influence of the beauty of holiness. We know not what deep, unutterable thoughts had stirred his heart; we cannot penetrate the inscrutable mystery of the union of the Divine and human natures.
We know that in his early youth he was continually advancing in wisdom. His mind unfolded itself gradually; perhaps the conception of the mystery of his Being, the wondrous memories of the glory which he had with the Father before the world was, the knowledge of his sacred mission, of his blessed office, dawned little by little on his holy human soul. Now he had reached his thirtieth year; he was in the full strength of manhood, bodily and intellectual; he had received an august consecration.
He was declared by the heavenly voice to be the beloved Son of God; the holy Dove had revealed him to the Baptist as the Christ, descending upon him with a message of peace from God to man, as, ages before, the dove had brought to the ark the welcome token that the wrath of God had passed away. He was "full of the Holy Ghost," strengthened for his work by that sacred Presence, as afterwards he was strengthened by the angel in his awful agony.
But great joy is often followed by great sorrow; very high spiritual experiences are often succeeded by seasons of peculiar temptation. It was so with Christ the Lord; it is so with advanced Christians now. The abundant grace vouchsafed unto them, the felt presence of the Holy Spirit, is granted to prepare them for the coming trials. They are strengthened with all might by his Spirit in the inner man, that they may be able to bear themselves manfully in the dread conflict, and to win the victory through his assisting grace.
2. The wilderness. The Spirit led him thither; it may be, to the dreary solitudes of Quarantana; it may be, to the rocks of Sinai. There was need of lonely meditation, of sustained prayer, of solitary preparation for his momentous task. Such an episode of solemn calm occurred in the lives of Moses, of Elijah, of St. Paul. Such an episode was interposed now between the wondrous manifestations of the Divine Presence and the hurry of hard, wearying labour that was to follow.
The Lord was made like unto us. In his perfect humanity he needed, as we do, time for quiet thought, time to collect himself, to brace himself for the coming trials, to realize the great change that was at hand, the strange contrast between the life that was coming, crowded with works of power and labours of love, and the peaceful seclusion of Nazareth which was now for ever past. We need our quiet days, time for recollection, self-examination, and solemn thought.
We must find time for meditation, if we are to advance far in the spiritual life. The Spirit led our Lord into the wilderness; the Spirit leads us from time to time to retirement for solitary devotional exercises.
3. The tempter.
(1) The tempter found our Lord in the wilderness. Solitude has its dangers, as well as busy life. The hermits, who in old times used to retire from the busy haunts of men, had their own peculiar trials. They could in some degree escape from outward temptations; they could not escape from their own thoughts, their own sinful hearts, the power and allurements of the evil one. Their temptations were different, but to the full as great as those of active life.
Probably the danger was greater; for God did not create us for the wilderness, for solitude; he has given us work to do for him. That work commonly lies in the world, among men. Work is a necessity for us. It was a curse; it becomes a blessing if it is performed in faith and loving obedience. Work is a great safeguard against temptation. Without work the thoughts run wild; often they wander into sinful fancies; often, turned always inward, they become morbid and unnatural. Solitude is good sometimes, for a while; but it should be an episode in a life of active work for God.
(2) The Lord was absolutely pure and holy. No sinful thought ever arose in his sacred heart; in his case there could be no temptation from within. But Satan tempted him. The temptations came from without, from the direct agency of the evil spirit. They did not harm him; they glanced off from the clear surface of his holy, soul. But they were real temptations. He hungered, as we do; he had all our natural longings for food, for rest, for other objects of human desire.
The suggestions of the wicked spirit solicited him, harassed him; he felt the appetite, the rising desire. But he crushed it down by the strength of a holy will. He set us an example; he overcame Satan for us.
(3) The Spirit led him into the wilderness to be tempted. It was part of his humiliation, part of his suffering, part of his redeeming work. It was necessary that he should learn, by his own experience in his sinless human nature, the bitter trials of temptation; that, having himself suffered being tempted, he might be able to succour them that are tempted; that we might have the help of his Divine sympathy in our temptations.
It was necessary for our salvation that he should in our flesh overcome the devil; that as Man, in our human nature, he might conquer that sin by which death came into the world; that as in Adam all died, even so in Christ might all be made alive. He hath given us an example, teaching us that by self-denial, prayer, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, we too may resist temptation.
But, more than this, if we are his, he abiding in us and we in him, then his victory is ours; in the strength of his victory we overcome the same dreadful enemy: "God giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." Therefore he was led by the Spirit to be tempted. We sometimes seem to be led into temptation; the temptation may be necessary for us, to try our faith, to brace our energies, to make us approved soldiers of the cross.
He cannot be a conqueror who has never fought a battle; that virtue is not the highest which is pure simply because it has never met with temptation. But "God will not suffer us to be tempted above that we are able." He who suffered being tempted is with his people in their hour of trial; his sympathy is their comfort; his strength their victory. It' need be, they are in heaviness through manifold temptations; but the trial of their faith is precious; it will be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.
(4) The temptation was necessary, but it must have caused the Lord exceeding anguish. We have admitted sin into our hearts; we have loved it in our madness; we cannot tell the intense loathing and horror which the presence of sin must cause in a pure and holy soul. The Lord Jesus, the most Holy One, endured for our salvation's sake to be confronted with that hateful being whose home is in the darkness and the burning flame, whose heart is filled with malice and cruelty, thirsting to destroy those precious souls whom the Lord loved so dearly, for whom he gave himself to die.
The close presence of evil, that loathsome thing which God hates, the wicked suggestions of Satan, must have been intensely horrible to the blessed Saviour. He endured all this for us; he loved us with so great a love.
4. The fasting. The Lord was absorbed in high thoughts and spiritual communion with the Father; this lifted him up for a time above the ordinary needs of humanity. His fast was miraculous, like the fast of Moses, of Elijah. But it is our example also in a measure; we too must fast and pray if we would conquer as the Saviour conquered. Our Father will reward those who fast after the pattern of the Lord, in the like spirit, in faith and in humility.
We must practise self-denial in little things, if we would gain strength to support us in the dread conflict with the tempter. Bodily exercise profiteth little in comparison with the inner spirit of self-mortification; but we cannot afford to despise those outward helps; and certainly we cannot do wrong in following the example of our Lord and. his apostles (Atti degli Apostoli 13:3; Act 14:23; 1 Corinzi 7:5; 2 Corinzi 6:5).
II. THE FIRST TEMPTATION.
1. The suggestion of the tempter.
(1) The doubt. "If thou be the Son of God." So he tempted Eve, "Hath God said?" So he tempts us now with his evil whispers, breathing doubts into our souls—doubts of the truth of God's revelation, doubts of his power and love, doubts of our own conversion: "If thou be a child of God." He suggests again and again that terrible "if," harassing our souls with miserable fears and awful perplexities.
He knew probably that Jesus was the Son of God; Jesus knew it certainly with a full, Divine consciousness. God grants the peace of God sooner or later to all who come to him in humility and faith. They may be sorely tried for a time with anxious doubts; but they shall find rest for their souls in Christ their Saviour. Only let them trust even amid fears; and in his good time the saddening doubt, "If thou be a child of God," will make room for the blessed assurance, "I know that my Redeemer liveth;" "I know whom I have believed."
(2) L'offerta del tentatore. "Comanda che queste pietre diventino pane". Era un appello all'appetito corporeo, alla concupiscenza della carne; la tentazione rivolta una volta a Eva: "l'albero era buono da mangiare". Il Signore ha fame. Non era conveniente, sussurrò il tentatore, che il Figlio di Dio fosse così afflitto; aveva solo bisogno di esprimere il suo potere. Quel potere era suo per il bene delle anime; il diavolo vorrebbe che lo usasse per soddisfare i suoi bisogni. Quindi ora tenta gli uomini ad usare per il progresso mondano, la gloria mondana, i mezzi che sono stati dati loro per operare la propria salvezza, per aiutare nell'opera di Dio nel mondo.
2 . Il Signore ' risposta s.
(1) "È scritto". Questa è stata la prima parola, per quanto ci è stato detto, pronunciata da nostro Signore dopo il suo battesimo. Era il Figlio di Dio; era pieno di Spirito Santo; ma inizia il suo ministero con le semplici parole: "Sta scritto". Incontra il tentatore con la spada dello Spirito. Così deve ora il cristiano. La memoria dovrebbe essere conservata fino in fondo con le parole sacre; dovrebbero essere impressi nel cuore dal pensiero santo e dall'obbedienza diligente, scritta lì dallo Spirito Santo di Dio.
Allora saranno a portata di mano pronti per l'uso nell'ora della prova, nella lotta mortale. Quindi scruta le Scritture; non accontentarsi della conoscenza della lettera; ma prega per la grazia di realizzare e conoscere per esperienza personale quel significato spirituale interiore senza il quale "la lettera uccide".
(2) "L'uomo non vivrà di solo pane". "Uomo", dice il Signore. Incontra il maligno come Uomo, nella nostra carne umana, e come Uomo vince. Lui vince per noi, nella nostra umanità; ci dà l'esempio affinché, mediante l'unione spirituale con l'unico Uomo santissimo, noi uomini possiamo condividere la sua vittoria, e vincere, come lui ha vinto. E questa è la sua lezione: "La vita di un uomo non consiste nell'abbondanza delle cose che possiede.
"La vita viene da Dio; egli soffiò nelle narici dell'uomo un alito di vita. Ha nutrito gli Israeliti nel deserto con la manna, il pane del cielo; ha sostenuto il suo Figlio benedetto nel deserto per tutto quel digiuno prolungato; può a suo modo sostieni la vita che Egli ha donato. L'anima che confida in Dio non significherà solo cibo comune mediante il "pane quotidiano" per il quale preghiamo. La vita è una cosa troppo grande, un dono troppo divino, per essere sostenuta interamente dalle cose esteriori.
La vera vita, la vita degna di questo nome, la vita degna di essere vissuta, ha bisogno di un cibo rabdomante: il Pane disceso dal cielo, il Signore Cristo stesso. L'uomo non vive di solo pane; perderà la vita chi cerca solo quel pane terreno. Cristo è la Vita, la Vita del mondo; vivono infatti, nel pieno significato della vita, coloro che hanno quella Vita dimorante in loro; vivono nella fede di Dio, confidando in lui. Le parole che escono dalla sua bocca sono il cibo delle loro anime, il soggiorno dei loro cuori; perché la Parola di Dio è viva e potente; vive e dimora per sempre.
III. LA SECONDA TENTAZIONE .
1 . Il suggerimento. Di nuovo il dubbio; l'allettante, o forse il sarcastico, "se". Ma questa volta l'orgoglio era il punto debole della natura umana che il tentatore cercava di trovare nel Signore: l'orgoglio della vita. L'albero, aveva sussurrato una volta a Eva, era un albero da desiderare per diventare saggi. Lo portò alla città santa, al tempio. Ahimè! il diavolo può trovare un ingresso lì, nella stessa Chiesa di Cristo; talvolta ha trovato un ingresso nei luoghi più alti della Chiesa visibile.
L'orgoglio è stata la rovina di molti che si sono imposti sui loro fratelli; l'orgoglio spirituale ha rovinato molti cristiani che un tempo sembravano non lontani dal regno di Dio. Lo pose sul pinnacolo del tempio, forse il pinnacolo da cui, anni dopo, Giacomo, fratello del Signore, fu precipitato per andare incontro alla morte del martire. Là ha posto il Signore in alto come il Signore del tempio, il Messia, il gran Re, il Sacerdote regale.
Gli ordinò di abbassarsi. Avrebbe mostrato il suo potere, la sua dignità, la sua maestà divina. Un tale miracolo, in un luogo simile, davanti agli occhi dei sacerdoti e del popolo riuniti, stabilirebbe subito le sue pretese; sarebbe stato subito riconosciuto come il Signore che doveva venire, il Sacerdote secondo l'ordine di Melchisedec; e ciò senza difficoltà, senza dolorose abnegazioni, senza croce.
2 . La citazione scritturale. Le parole erano vere, ma c'era un'importante omissione. «Egli incaricherà di te i suoi angeli», disse il salmista, «di custodirti in tutte le tue vie». "In tutte le tue vie", in tutte le vie che ci ha indicato la sua provvidenza, non in vie scelte da lui stesso, che non aveva stabilito. Le sante parole della Scrittura possono essere mal applicate; possono essere usati per suggerire un significato che non sono mai stati destinati a trasmettere; possono essere oggetto di controversie e impiegate semplicemente come mezzi per ottenere una vittoria teologica.
Un tale uso della Bibbia tende a produrre orgoglio. "La conoscenza si gonfia". L'orgoglio perverte le parole sacre; uomini di cuore santi e umili, guidati dallo Spirito di Dio, entrano nel loro significato profondo e benedetto. Il diavolo avrebbe potuto sviare qualche uomo vanitoso; a tali la Scrittura citata avrebbe potuto sembrare appropriata, e così avrebbe potuto essere sedotto fino alla sua rovina. Ma il Signore era mite e umile di cuore; non cercò onore dagli uomini; non c'era alcun pensiero di esibizione, nessuna ostentazione nella sua anima santa.
Sapeva cosa significava veramente la Scrittura. Gli angeli benedetti sono incaricati della cura dei santi di Dio; li custodiscono in tutte le loro vie; li portano nelle loro mani; ma non se cessano di essere santi, non "quando il giusto si allontana dalla sua giustizia e commette iniquità"; non quando diventa presuntuoso e ostinato. Testi citati male, Scritture mal applicate, non hanno irretito il Signore; non irretiranno l'umile cristiano che confida non nella propria conoscenza o nelle proprie forze, ma nel Dio vivente.
3 . Il Signore s' risposta.
(1) Again the appeal to Scripture: "It is written again." Scripture is best interpreted by Scripture; one part of Holy Writ throws light upon another. The devil takes the text which seems to suit his purpose; he isolates it; he draws wrong conclusions from it. The Lord brings another passage to bear on the suggested act. He teaches us how to use God's Holy Word. We must compare Scripture with Scripture; we may not "so expound one place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another."
(2) "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." It is tempting God to put ourselves into dangers to which he has not called us, to expect his help in self-chosen ways, to look for his miraculous interposition to save us from the consequences of our own folly. To trust God is faith, to tempt him is presumption. We cannot trust him with too entire a confidence while we are walking in the path of obedience and duty, the path marked out for us by his providence; but to choose our own path, to thrust ourselves into perilous positions, to think of forcing, so to speak, a miracle from God, this is fanaticism, not faith.
Christ's miracles were part of the great scheme of redemption; they were wrought to relieve distress or to increase the faith of his followers; not needlessly, not to display his power or to satisfy curiosity; not at the bidding of Satan, or the Pharisees, or Herod. The Saviour would not work a miracle from any of these lower motives; it would have been inconsistent with his high and holy character.
Such a miracle, if it were possible, would be the work of a faith like that described by St. Paul—a faith which, though it might remove mountains, was destitute of the blessed grace of love, and therefore nothing worth in the sight of God.
IV. THE THIRD TEMPTATION.
1. The suggestion. Satan had long ago whispered to Eve that the tree was "pleasant to the eyes." He had tempted her through the lust of the eyes; now he raises before the eyes of the Lord a vision of unexampled grandeur. As the angel (Apocalisse 21:10) carried away St. John in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed him that great city, the holy Jerusalem; so now the tempter showed our Lord all the kingdoms of the world, a dream of world-wide empire, majesty, and power beyond all that Alexander had once attained, or that Tiberius then possessed.
Satan had been twice defeated. He felt that he must put forth all his energies. A small bribe might lure weak men to their destruction; it does not need a kingdom to ensnare them. Satan offered to the Lord the empire of the world. It was a tempting prospect. The Lord knew that he was the Messiah, the Prince of the kings of the earth; all this glory was rightfully his; he was to rule over the nations, and his rule was for the happiness of mankind.
It seemed now within his grasp. He would use it (so, perhaps, the tempter whispered; so he would whisper, we know, to a mere man in such a position)—he would use it for the best interests of the human race; he would put down the avarice, cruelty, lust, oppression, which reigned rampant in the world; he would improve the condition of the poor; he would put a stop to war and violence and bloodshed; he would introduce universal peace, universal happiness; and that at once and with ease, without self-sacrifice, without labour, without the cross; at once, by one simple act (so a weak man might say)—an act which, perhaps, was not right, but which was only momentary, which could be soon repented of, the guilt of which would be as nothing compared with the great good that was to follow.
So a man might reason with himself; so in smaller matters many men have reasoned with themselves, and have deceived themselves. The end, they said, sanctified the means; they would do evil, so they thought, that good might come. But they deceived their own hearts; the temptation came from the wicked one. Men never do evil from good motives; the thing cannot be. They may say so; they may have said it so often to themselves that they have come almost to believe it by force of habitual self-deceit.
But the motive was really selfish, their own interest, their own gratification, their own ease. The good end was only talk, mere pretence to gloss over their sin, to hide their real character from men, even, if it might be, from themselves; if it were possible, from their God. It is Satan who suggests the sinful compliance; he conceals its wickedness; he uses it to destroy the soul. And his promises are deceitful; he offers the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; it is not his to give; he is a liar from the beginning; he promises, he does not give;.
his deluded followers lose their own souls, but do not always gain the good things of this world. Or, if they gain them, they find that rank, riches, pleasure, bought by sin, are but dust and ashes in the mouth—vanity of vanities. The enjoyment is but a dream, a phantom; the misery, alas! is very real.
2. The Lord's answer.
(1) He calls the tempter by his name, Satan, the adversary. He had revealed himself now; his previous advances had been insidious; he had even claimed the countenance of Holy Scripture. Now he stands confessed as the enemy of God; he claims the worship which is due to God alone. The Lord expresses his indignation: "Get thee hence, Satan!" It is right to call an evil thing by an evil name; the use of fair names for foul things is one of the deceits of the wicked one; it tends to hide the malignity of sin, and helps to entrap unwary souls. A transgression is not an indiscretion; a sin is not a misfortune.
(2) Again he says, "It is written." The Bible is many-sided; its range extends over all the needs of humanity; there is help to be found there against all temptations. Whatever our difficulties may be, our perplexities, our trials, we shall find light and guidance in the blessed Word of God, if we have been used to study it aright in earnest prayer, in dependence on the promised aid of God the Holy Ghost.
(3) "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God." Here is the Christian's victory. God must be first in our hearts. Nothing can be right which tends to turn our soul's devotion from the Lord. However fair the prospect may seem, whatever excuses Satan may suggest, however he may palliate the guilt, or hide the danger, or draw enticing pictures of advantages to follow, here is the one only right answer, the answer of the Lord Jesus to the tempter: "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
" Our heart's allegiance is due to God; he is our rightful King. To try to serve two masters, to halt between God and the world, is to fail in that allegiance, to transfer it to "the world-rulers of this darkness;" it is, in effect, to take Satan for our master, to worship him instead of God. The one hope of safety in the midst of dangers is to hold fast to the prime duty, the highest privilege of the Christian: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart." He who herein imitates the Saviour is more than conqueror.
V. THE VICTORY.
1. The devil leaveth him. He had failed completely. The clear, calm decision of the Saviour's holy soul, the resolute will, sorely tried and harassed, but ever steadfast and unflinching in the path of duty, had defeated the tempter at all points. He had nothing more left that he could do: he fled, awed by the Saviour's perfect purity. So the devil fleeth now before those who resist him in the strength of Christ. Our victory is sure if only we are steadfast; for Christ hath conquered for us, and we are his and he is ours.
2. The angels came. The strife was o'er, the battle done; angels came and ministered to the wants of the triumphant Lord. They had watched the struggle, we may be sure, with the deepest, the most awful interest; they had sympathized with the blessed Lord in the intense anguish of that dread agony of temptation. They rejoiced in his victory. Even so they help the Christian warrior now in his conflict against the same dreadful foe: 'The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him;" and "There is Joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth.
" The moments of victory—victory after sore temptation, are sweet beyond expression; they are sweetened by the unseen presence and sympathy of the blessed angels, rejoicing with the Christian's joy, "singing sweet fragments of the songs above" to cheer the wearied pilgrim.
LESSONS.
1. The devil who tempted Christ tempts us now. Temptations will come; they come every day; but there are decisive moments in the life of every one. Prepare for those decisive conflicts by prayer for the Spirit, by meditation, by the practice of daily self-denial.
2. Imitate the Saviour. Treasure in the heart the blessed words of Holy Scripture.
3. Love not the world. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life are not of the Father, but of the world.
4. "Resist the devil, and he shall flee from you."
The beginning of our Lord's ministry.
I. HE REMOVES TO CAPERNAUM.
1. John was cast into prison. His ministry was ended; the Lord's begins. God continues his'servants' work; when one passes away, another takes his place; when the voice of one prophet is silenced, a greater follows, Each must work in faith while time is given; the work is not man's, but God's. He will fulfil it. His servants may seem to be laid aside and to be forgotten; he will carry on their work. He does not forget their labours; he will reward them openly.
2. Jesus begins to preach.
(1) He repeats the words of the Baptist, but from his lips they have a deeper meaning. "Repent ye," he said; the Greek word means literally "change your mind." That great change is the work of God the Holy Ghost, but yet in some sense the work of man. The Lord would not urge men to do that which in no sense depended on their own will; such an exhortation would be meaningless, ironical; it could not come from the loving heart of the Lord Jesus.
The soul must yield itself to the blessed influences of the Holy Spirit; the will must consent to be guided by the holy will of God; there must be a felt effort to come after Christ and follow his example, a real striving to enter in at the strait gate, and to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling. Such a change is necessary in all the children of the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom was close at hand now, for Christ himself was the King; he was preaching the gospel of the kingdom; he was inviting men into his own kingdom; the gate of that kingdom was repentance.
(2) He preaches by the Sea of Galilee. It had been the land of the shadow of death. The people sat in darkness—a deep, spiritual darkness which might be felt. But the light was springing up, the great light of truth and righteousness. So now many souls are lying in darkness; but when the Lord's voice is heard, "Repent, be converted," the light arises in the heart that once was dark, the great light of the gracious Saviour's presence.
(3) The true servant of the Lord must be full of the Holy Ghost; he must be tried and approved by experience of many temptations; he must be willing to work in the dark places if God calls him there.
II. THE FOUR APOSTLES.
1. The call. The Lord saw them as he walked by the sea. It was not the first interview; two of them certainly, probably three, possibly all the four, already knew him (Giovanni 1:40, Giovanni 1:41). Now he calls them to be his apostles, to forsake their old employment, and to give themselves up to the work of the kingdom of heaven, lie could read their hearts; he knew their characters, their capabilities. He calls his servants still; it is that Divine call alone which raises up true and faithful men for the sacred ministry of his Church.
2. The words of the call. "Follow me."
(1) Those who would do Christ's work faithfully and successfully must follow him themselves. They must know him by that inner personal knowledge which is granted only to those who, having been called of Christ, have through grace obeyed the calling. They must themselves in their daily walk imitate the holy example of the Lord. They must be content to bear the cross, following the Lord who bore the cross for them and died upon the cross for their salvation.
They must be willing for his sake to renounce earthly ambitions and the hope of earthly riches, as he turned away from the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, and as his first apostles left their earthly all—their nets, their boats, their father—to give themselves wholly to his service. But
(2) the words contain a promise as well as a command. Those whom he hath called are invited to share the blessedness of spiritual communion with the Lord; they are to live in that holy fellowship which is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And they are to share his glory: "The glory which thou gavest me I have given them." They are to follow him, not only through their earthly pilgrimage, but onwards beyond the grave, tilt they reach the golden city and behold face to face the glory of the Lord.
3. Fishers of men. Their earthly calling was a parable of the higher calling to which they were now summoned. God's ministers must lake a lesson from the fishermen of the Sea of Galilee. They must try to know thoroughly the portion of the work assigned to them, as the fishers knew every corner of the lake. They must study the art of winning souls, as the fishers studied how best to allure the fish into their nets.
They must be willing to work hard, to toil all the night. They must work on patiently even when they seem to be taking nothing. But they must have confidence in the Lord's promise, and expect by his grace and in his own good time to "enclose a great multitude of fishes," to draw many souls to Christ.
III. THE CIRCUIT THROUGH GALILEE.
1. The preaching of Jesus.
(1) He went about all Galilee; he was not like John the Baptist, for the most part stationary; he was in constant movement. The people came to John for baptism and instruction! the Lord carried the gospel to the people. He is an Example to his ministers, an Example of unwearying activity and care for all the souls within his reach.
(2) He taught habitually in the synagogues; he was soon recognized as a Rabbi, and invited to address the people at their ordinary meetings in the synagogue. The synagogue-worship was not prescribed in the Old Testament. It was an institution which sprang up probably during the Captivity, and spread through the towns of Palestine after the return. The Lord attended the synagogues; he kept the Feast of Dedication. They were institutions of the Jewish Church, not ordered in the Scriptures, but not repugnant to the Word of God. Christians should observe the ordinances of the Christian Church.
(3) He preached the gospel of the kingdom, the good news that the kingdom of heaven was at hand—the kingdom of which Daniel had prophesied, the kingdom which should never be destroyed, the kingdom prefigured by the stone cut out without hands, which became a mountain and filled the whole earth. He himself was the King; the four whom he had called, the few disciples who followed him; were the beginning of the kingdom—the kingdom which was destined to fill the whole earth.
It was good news, indeed; it spoke of peace, and purity, and love, and hope beyond the grave to a world wearied out with war and lust and cruelty, a world which had lost what faith there once was in God, in goodness, in immortality.
2. His miracles. He would do no mighty works to relieve his own hunger or to display his own power; but he was ever ready to listen to the cry of pain and sorrow. He would do no miracle at the bidding of the tempter or to satisfy the curiosity of Herod; now among scenes of suffering he was prodigal of his miraculous energy. He teaches us by his Divine example that holy teaching and works of Christian love should go together.
His followers must show loving care, not only for the souls, but also for the bodies of the sick and suffering, for so did the blessed Lord himself. It is vain to preach the gospel of love unless we show the power of that gospel by works of love ourselves. He was moved with compassion for suffering humanity; his followers have built hospitals and ministered to the sick and dying. Care for the sick is one of the marks by which the King recognizes the blessed children of his Father. He cared for them himself; his true disciples imitate him.
3. The multitudes. Crowds followed him now. His fame spread from north to south through the whole Holy Land, and even beyond its borders. They came from Decapolis and from Jerusalem, from the half-heathen country peopled by the descendants of Alexander's soldiers, and from the holy city, the centre of the influence of Pharisees and priests. His influence spread wider and wider; his holy teaching, his works of mercy, attracted crowds from every quarter.
It seemed as if the whole world was going after him, as if all Palestine would submit to his authority. It was not to be so; sunshine would give place to darkness, favour to persecution. The disciples of the Lord must not trust in popular applause; they may have it, it comes sometimes; but it is uncertain, fickle, not to be relied on. We must do our duty, looking simply to Jesus, not to human praise.
LESSONS.
1. The Lord calls his ministering servants. They must follow him; they must preach where his providence sends them; they must watch for souls as they that must give account.
2. They must preach repentance and the good news of the kingdom; they must care, as far as lies in their power, for the sick and suffering.
3. They must give no heed to the praise of men; they must think only of saving souls and pleasing their Lord.
HOMILIES BY W.F. ADENEY
Christ tempted.
The very fact that Christ was subject to temptation is immensely significant, both as regards his nature and life and as regards our experience of temptation.
I. THE PICTURE OF CHRIST. We see him assailed by the tempter, wrestling with the fiend, and flinging the monster at every bout. Jesus tempted in the wilderness appears Very different from the Christ seated at the right hand of the Majesty on high. Here some remarkable features of his nature and work are unveiled.
1. His perfect humanity. Plainly Jesus was a Man. He lacked nothing that is truly and essentially human. Fie had a human soul to be tempted, as well as a human body to suffer hunger. In the temptation he comes down to the level of our poor, toiling, fighting humanity. Thus all the grandeur of his Divinity does not remove one jot from the completeness of his humanity.
2. His brotherly sympathy. "He was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin" (Ebrei 4:15), in order that he might be able to succour the tempted (Ebrei 2:18). This was his apprenticeship to his office of High Priest. He understands our battle with evil, for he fought a similar battle himself.
3. His redeeming work. Christ came to overthrow the works of the devil. He began by facing and conquering the spirit of evil himself. Satan had never been completely vanquished before. The utter rout of his forces in this battle in the wilderness must have left him weakened for all future encounters.
4. His victorious purity. Christ was tempted, yet he ,did not fall. He came out of the ordeal tested and revealed in his sinless strength. Now it cannot be said that the goodness of Christ is only perfect because he had not an opportunity to do wrong. He was met by the strongest possible inducements to sin. Yet he resisted them. The result was all gain. It was good for Christ to be tempted. Therefore he was led by the Spirit to the wilderness.
II. THE REVELATION OF TEMPTATION.
1. Temptation may come from without. St. James shows how it often springs up in our own hearts from the evil lurking there. Old sins shed seeds which spring up as new sins. But this is not the only way in which temptations arise, or the first man could not have been tempted, nor could Christ. Adam and Eve were tempted by the serpent, and Christ was tempted by the devil.
(1) Therefore a good man is not to expect to be free from temptation.
(2) Temptation is no sign of sin. The tempted need not accuse themselves of guilt in their being liable to temptation. Sin only begins when we yield to temptation in our own wills.
2. Temptation lays hold of innocent desires. Christ was tempted by sinful appeals to what was innocent within him. He was tempted to gratify natural desires—hunger, etc., but in a wrong way. He had not our indwelling sins to urge him to evil, but he had greater powers to keep in control. It would seem that, with the descent of the Holy Spirit at his baptism, there had come the consciousness of his great and awful power to work miracles.
His temptations were inducements to abuse that power for selfish ends. Every new acquisition is a new ground for temptation; every enlargement and growth of faculty carries with it fresh possibilities of evil—and also, if the evil is resisted, of good.—W.F.A.
The temptation of hunger.
This was a serious encounter. One rebuff was not sufficient to drive off the tempter. The devil is most persevering; only persevering resistance can hope to overcome him. The successive temptations were varied in form. The tempter is wily and subtle. If he does not succeed in one way he will try another. Each temptation has its own features; yet there is a common character running through them all.
In every case Jesus was urged to use his miraculous powers and Messianic privileges for his own advantage. The great conflict raged round one central position—the life-work of Jesus as the Christ. Should this be degraded to selfish ends? or should it be carried on in self-sacrifice for its highest purposes? Let us consider the first temptation.
I. THE TEMPTATION THROUGH HUNGER.
1. The tempter waited for his opportunity. For forty days Jesus fasted in the wilderness. All this while the tempter delayed, like a wild beast crouching in the bush and waiting for a favourable moment to pounce on his prey. Would that Christians had Satan's patience in watching for souls!
2. The tempter chose a weak moment. When Christ was exhausted by lack of food. Physical weakness may indicate the moment of approaching temptation; much more probably it will come in times of spiritual weakness.
3. The tempter worked on a strong natural appetite. Hunger. This is a fundamental appetite in all living animals. When it is keenly excited it will turn the gentlest beings into wild beasts. Beware of a hungry man!
4. The tempter suggested an easy satisfaction. The famished man is haunted by tantalizing visions of food. Nothing is more natural than that the stones of the wilderness should suggest the idea of the bread they resembled in form and colour!
II. HOW IT IS MET.
1. By an appeal to Scripture. In dark moments we cannot trust our own thoughts, for temptation is sophistical. Then, like Christ, we may find the advantage of a familiar knowledge of the Bible. If he needed this extraneous aid—he the Sinless! much more do we whose thoughts are dark and foolish.
2. By imparting a new current of thought. Here was the use of the recollection of Scripture. So long as his mind rested on his physical condition he could not but fed the terrible force of the temptation. By a great effort of will he turned the current of his thinking into another channel. Knowing the Bible from early days, he found a helpful scriptural idea flashing through his mind.
3. By consideration of the dignity of man. The suggestion of the tempter is degrading. Christ rises above it by considering the true greatness of man. This is not a method which he only can follow, because it is not the dignity of the Son of God, but the dignity of man, that he thinks of. Every man may avail himself of the same bracing thought. There is a higher life than that of the body. Man is more than a feeding animal. In his true self he is not wholly dependent on bread.
4. By a reflection on man's chief food. Man needs more than bread, and man can feed his soul on the better food even while his body is fasting. Probably the very purpose of Christ's fast was that he might give himself wholly to feeding his higher life on the Word, the truth of God.—W.F.A.
Presumption and ambition.
All three of the temptations of our Lord turned on the abuse of his newly developed Messianic powers; but while the first temptation urged him to use those powers for the satisfaction of a natural appetite common to all men, the other two were concerned directly with his unique position and destiny. The tempter perceives that he has made a mistake in choosing too low a ground on which to approach One so completely emancipated from the dominion of the body as Christ. Therefore he nosy proceeds to ply him with more elaborate motives.
I. PRESUMPTION. Note the perseverance of the tempter: foiled in one attack, he immediately makes another. Observe his versatility: seeing that one line of assault is ineffectual, he shifts his basis. Consider the special characteristics of the second temptation.
1. Favourable circumstances. The devil sets Christ on the pinnacle of the temple. That this was probably done in vision, or even only in imagination, does not affect the essential nature of the temptation. Mentally such was the condition of Christ, and the force of any temptation is largely dependent on the state of mind of its victim.
2. A primary doubt. "If thou art the Son of God." This thought, repeated from the first temptation, shows how doubt may be used as a door to sin.
3. A Scripture quotation. Christ had quoted Scripture; the devil can do the same—but with a difference. Christ perceived the true meaning of the words he cited, and used them aright; the tempter made an unworthy use of Scripture, and he did it by simply insisting on its literal meaning. A false light on truth may turn it into a lie.
4. A dreadful fascination. Many have felt the impulse to throw themselves down from a cliff or a high building. With Christ this was immensely aggravated by the thought that surely God would not let his Son suffer any harm.
5. A masterly rebuff. Again Jesus quotes from the Old Testament. Scripture must be interpreted by Scripture. One truth cannot be inconsistent with another truth. A Divine promise can never justify what God has forbidden.
6. A vital lesson. There is a limit to the security of faith. It is useless to trust God when we are off the path of duty. We have no right to expect God's protection in dangers which we manufacture for ourselves, tie who courts temptation invites his own ruin.
II. AMBITION. Yet once again the indomitable enemy of souls rallies his shattered forces and hurls them on the Saviour in a last mad assault.
1. An open attack. Disguise is now useless; so Satan scorns any longer to use it. There is a certain fascination in ugliness. If serpents do not glide up to their victims unseen, they approach them most openly, paralyzing them with horror; sin itself has a hideous attractiveness in its naked blackness.
2. A powerful appeal. Christ is to have the world for his possession. He comes to be the King; here is his kingdom, and an easy way of reaching it.
3. A diabolical condition. To worship Satan. This is just to make evil principles the rule of life. Such principles lie very near to the hand of the public man. Macchiavellian politicians cannot see how they are to be avoided. Pander to the passions of men, and you will win their applause—that is gaining kingdoms by the worship of the devil.
4. A bold rejection. We need not behave to the tempter with courtesy. It is dangerous to treat with him. "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." It needs an effort to do this. With Christ it meant the rejection of all worldly success and the deliberate choice of the way of the cross. Yet this choice is rewarded by angel-ministry.—W.F.A.
Light in darkness.
The end of John's work was the signal for the commencement of Christ's. Thus our Lord would appear to some as the successor of the Baptist. To a nearer view it seems that the completion of the preparation makes it fitting that the full advent of the kingdom should be manifested.
I. CHRIST COMES TO PEOPLE SITTING IN DARKNESS. Here is the prophet's image—a land of gloom, its inhabitants seated disconsolately and helplessly, not having enough light to arise and do their work, or any heart to bestir themselves and seek for such a light, till it suddenly.bursts upon their surprised and startled gaze.
1. What is the darkness? Primarily, ignorance. Without Christ we do not know God or ourselves, our duty or our destiny. From this ignorance comes a sense of dull bewilderment, and that sinks down to the deadness of despair. Or if there is external cheerfulness, the benighted soul shrinks into torpor and death. In this state the greater darkness of sin invades the conscience, and sits like a brooding raven hatching baleful birds of the night.
2. Who are the people? The immediate reference is to the inhabitants of Northern Palestine—those unfortunate Israelites who were the first to forsake the God of their fathers, and the first to fall under the rod of the heathen oppressor. Now we see two great classes of dark souls.
(1) The pagan nations. Here there opens before us the vast field of foreign missions—dark in spiritual ignorance, error, and superstition; dark too in sin, for "the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty" (Salmi 74:20).
(2) The heathen of Christendom. Many of these do not know the bare elements of the gospel; many more have no spiritual perception of its power and life; and multitudes live in benighted regions of moral corruption.
3. What are these people doing! They sit—that is all. They seem to be content with their condition. A strange lethargy has taken possession of them. This is partly inevitable; for they cannot illuminate their own dark souls.
II. THE ADVENT OF CHRIST IS THE DAWNING OF A GREAT LIGHT.
1. The light does not arise out of the darkness. The idea of the prophet is that the people of the dark north see the light that is rising in happy Judaea—so splendid and far-reaching is its radiance. Christ appeared as a Jew. Even to the Jews he came not as they expected, and his work drew none of its splendour from their goodness or their theology. The sun is not dependent on the candle-factory for its illuminating properties.
2. The light penetrates to the most remote regions. There is no limit to the penetrating power of light when this is not counteracted by the intervention of some opaque body. Every star radiates light through the whole universe. The light of Christ is for the darkest places of the earth. In our own day it has reached the heart of "darkest Africa;" it is penetrating the dense populations of China; it is spreading like a grey dawn over the vast empire of India; it shines in diamond points on many a remote island of the southern seas; and still, in spite of shameful darkness, it is brighter in England to-day than ever it was.
3. The light calls to repentance and heralds the kingdom of heaven. Christ took up the Baptist's message—beginning just where his forerunner had left off. The light of Christ reveals the sin of man. When we see Christ we see the door into the kingdom of heaven. Christ sheds light to bring men to repentance, and to guide them into the kingdom.—W.F.A.
"Fishers of men."
Jesus was not content to preach the word and leave it to work unseen and uncared for. He desired to gather in a harvest of souls. His first effort in this direction was to form a little group of recognized and confessed disciples who should help him in his great work. Himself the supreme Fisher of men, he drew choice souls that he might fit them to undertake the same work in seeking for others,
I. THE FISHERS.
1. Their relationship. Brothers. Family union is consecrated by Christ.
2. Their class. Christ was a carpenter; the first apostles were fishermen; St. Paul was a weaver. Surely, then, the working classes of all people ought to be interested in Christianity. If social arrangements mean anything in religion, these classes should be the first to claim the gospel as their own. Why are so many of them the last to do so?
3. Their work. The life of the sea was a good discipline. These theologica; students of Christ had no preliminary "arts course." Nature was their university; hard toil and danger made their discipline. They were not educated as scholars; they were schooled as men. It is best to have. both trainings, but we can more easily dispense with the first than with the second.
4. Their immediate occupation. They were at work—casting a net. We are never so fit for Christ to meet us as when we are doing our daily duty.
II. THE CALL. In St. John we see that these men already knew Christ (Giovanni 1:40); but they had not yet learnt that he would wish them to be his constant companions.
1. The essential character of the call.
(1) From Christ. He is not willing to be alone in his great work. He seeks associates.
(2) To individual men. All are invited to his grace (Giovanni 7:37). But separate men are called to separate spheres of work. How, then, shall we recognize our call when it comes, seeing that Christ is no longer with us in the flesh? By the opening of a door, by the consciousness of a gift, by the conviction of conscience.
2. The twofold contents o/the call.
(1) To follow Christ. This comes first. Only they can serve Christ who follow him. We must first be Christians if we would do Christian work. The most Christ-like are the best fishers of men.
(2) To win men. This is better than catching fish in the lake. Thus Christ promotes his disciples. Note the practical aim—so intelligible in Christ's manner of presenting it to fishermen. Much spiritual energy is dissipated by vagueness. We beat the air for want of an object. But true Christian work is practical. It is to fill the gospel net.
III. THE RESPONSE,
1. Its promptness. "Straightway," etc. There is no excuse for delay when Christ calls. The fisherman may say he is not fit to be an apostle; but not he but Christ is the Judge of his fitness. There is no time for delay. The harvest is plenteous, and the labourers are few.
2. Its absoluteness. They left all. Christ does not call all his people to abandon their secular occupations, but when such a call comes, there is no excuse for parrying it. The obedience must be unconditional.
3. Its action. They did not merely assent verbally. They followed Christ. Our Christianity is seen, not in the creeds we profess, but in the way in which we go.—W.F.A.
The Galilaean ministry.
Three things are here described in regard to the Galilaean ministry of our Lord—the work of Christ; the popular fame; and the consequent conduct of the people.
I. THE WORK OF CHRIST.
1. It was itinerant. John the Baptist stayed in the wilderness, while the people flocked to him; Jesus went about among the people, seeking them. Thus we see his sociability, his graciousness of spirit, and his desire to include many in the blessings he brought.
2. It was not revolutionary. Christ preached in the synagogues. He was not yet excommunicated, and he used his privilege of access to the public assemblies of the Jews in order to link on his new teaching with the old truth and piety of Israel.
3. It was instructive. "Teaching." Christ based his synagogue instructions in the exposition of Scripture (Luca 4:16).
4. It was declaratory. "Preaching." This was heralding the advent of the kingdom, and it seems to have been done in the open air—in streets and market-places and by the seashore. Christ desires all to hear the call of his gospel.
5. It was healing. First came the teaching and preaching; for these were most important. But Christ was both merciful and powerful. He had compassion on sickness, and he had power to cure it. His gospel is for this world as well as for the next, for physical amelioration as well as for spiritual salvation.
II. HIS POPULAR FAME.
1. Its early origin. In Galilee Christ immediately rises into popularity. His very aspect was gracious; his words were beyond comparison with any other teaching; his miracles were as beneficent as wonderful. It is not surprising that he was popular. All who know his grace and goodness have reason to adore and love him.
2. Its wide circulation. It passed beyond the borders of Galilee, and through all Syria. It is even now spreading through the world. Yet it is strange that nearly two thousand years should have passed before the greater part of mankind has even heard of his name. That name is not the private property of the select few. He has come to be the Saviour of the world.
III. THE CONDUCT OF THE PEOPLE. The fame of Christ was not lost on those who heard it. It is useless merely to know of Christ, his work, and his gospel. The knowledge is useful just in proportion as it leads to action. Now, the action of the multitudes who were affected by the renown of Christ was twofold:
1. Bringing the needy to Christ. It is one of the marvellous effects of Christ's work in the hearts of men that he induces them to bring others to him. The compassion of Christ spreads, through those who know him, out to the needy. A true Christian must be an evangelist.
2. Following Christ. Multitudes felt the spell of his presence, and were drawn to him with an enthusiasm of devotion. In too many cases this was but a superficial, temporary movement. It is possible to follow Christ by outward action in Church-life, and not to be his true disciples inwardly. The inward following is just the very heart and essence of Christianity. A Christian is not one who merely believes certain things about Christ, but one who also follows him.—W.F.A.
HOMILIES BY P.C. BARKER
The preliminaries of the ordeal temptations of Jesus Christ.
The baptism of water, to which Jesus Christ had submitted in obedience to the human nature which he had assumed, and to the conditions under which he had assumed it, is now succeeded by the more significant, far more intrinsic, inward baptism of temptation. Let us here consider—
I. WHAT THIS BAPTISM OF TEMPTATION REALLY MEANS AND AMOUNTS TO. It means a testing, practical investigation into
(1) the moral direction of a man's will; and
(2) the strength of it in that direction.
The present associations of the word and the thing temptation in the minds of us all are perhaps almost without exception of an unfavourable kind. It arises from the fact that temptation in the original example of it, and in the infinite majority of all cases from that time to the present, issued in disaster. Our way, therefore, is both to dread it for ourselves, and to attach a bad name to it. But if the issue of the original temptation had been the opposite of what it was, and had the amazing majority of all succeeding cases taken pattern of it, we can easily imagine how the mere utterance of the word would have availed to strike a joyous key-note; and the word itself been the watchword of noble endeavour and enthusiastic effort.
Till Jesus, however, the word knew no association of this kind. It is, then, in this sense that Jesus and temptation are brought into relation. His moral bent and the strength of it are to be as really and as fairly tested as were those of the first Adam. Nor is it less evident that, while the temptation-test of the first Adam was presented to him in the simplest possible form, and when he was no way "a-hungred," that of the second Adam is described in brief in that threefold form which stands for all the rest as regards its matter, and with every accompanying circumstance of aggravation.
II. AT WHOSE INSTANCE THE DATE OF IT WAS DETERMINED. Though Jesus was always moved by the Holy Spirit, yet it is here with distinct emphasis said, "He was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil." In that dimmest background of time to which the garden of Eden belongs, it is at present impossible to institute comparison between the age of Adam and that of Christ on the days of their temptation respectively; but it may be held that there is a ripe time, an exact time, in the life of every man, known to the Spirit and appropriated by the Spirit, for the critical temptation of life.
It is true that we cannot say that temptation is, except in a few cases, the final, deciding one, so far as time is concerned; but perhaps oftener than men think it is to solemn truth the crucial one, the one on which hinge many succeeding victories, each made easier, or disgraceful defeats, each less regretted and less striven against. Surely it is legitimate and real source of comfort for all those who seek the right, and would do faithfully the battle with the tempter, to have this view of the time and occasion of the battle put before them on such high authority, that they are adapted and timed of the Spirit.
It may also well be observed here that so surely as the Spirit led, so meekly Jesus followed. He followed without resistance, without murmur, and without shrinking, so far as his own conflict or humiliation in meeting such an enemy was concerned. Calm submission before conflict, steadfast determination to encounter the enemy in the path of our life, and unfaltering trust in the Stronger than self,—these are the omens that go before the successful as well as the valiant spiritual warrior.
III. THE PLACE OF THE TEMPTATION. It can scarcely be sustained that the "wilderness" (described here by the same word as in Matteo 4:1 and Matteo 4:3 of the previous chapter) denotes absolutely desert tracts of country. It must probably mean the same as in the former chapter, the thinly inhabited and vaster pastoral stretches of country.
There can be no doubt, however, that some point is to be understood as made in this kind of scene or theatre being appointed for Christ's temptation. In the world's actual life the occasion of temptation abounds in the crowd and in the solitary place. It is still a study and a question in which it may abound most. On the other hand, perhaps, it may be held—and in analogy with much else in matter quite different—that though in the crowded city temptation may be yielded to most recklessly, yet conflict, and the fiercer and more prolonged conflict, and remorse, and the fiercer and more prolonged remorse, find solitude to a special degree their thriving ground, and make it all their own as battle-ground. The analysis would be of this kind. In the wilderness:
1. The larger force and number of the spiritual powers of the individual will have the chance of coming into action. The calculating will be more and more manifold with the effect of making the consenting more deliberate.
2. The position will be a clearer one of antagonists just opposed to each other, the one with no help from friends on which to fall back; the other when he would do his worst, with no hindrance arising from a sense of intimidation, as conscious that others are onlookers, and they such as sympathize with his victim, not with himself. The sense of isolation will be a weakness to the assaulted; the sense of unobservedness will be added unscrupulousness to the assaulter.
3. The feelings of the tempted will be naturally and almost inevitably highly stimulated, probably often in a morbid condition. It would need a spirit to which all goodness and all strength were already native to remain uninfluenced by the associations or, otherwise put, the non-associations, of the wilderness. Nevertheless, the victory once won, these shall leave the victor stronger than if all surroundings had been in his favour.
4. Though the trial must be in these aspects severer, yet, everything considered, it will also be the fairer test of the person in his own real self.
IV. THE PERSON OF THE TEMPTER. It is stated with distinctness that Jesus was led up—was led up by the Spirit, was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness, was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness in order to be tempted, i.e. meet the ordeal of temptation, and this at the ministration of "the devil." The naturalness and very harmony of the verse and the narrative are with a ruthless gratuitousness set at nought if we are not at liberty to learn here
(1) the personality of the devil, as a thing upheld by the authority of the New Testament. We learn
(2) that our great Head and Leader, the second Adam, the Captain of our salvation, the Author and Finisher of our faith; was ordained to meet the ordeal of temptation, in what must be considered. the most direct and the most fierce and concentrated form. We may very probably be justly reminded here
(3) that both the genius of temptation at the first, as temptation is constituted in the present Life, originated with Satan, and also that it is still and always really his peculium, in whatever disguised and sugared form of circumstance, apparent accident and the like, it may seem to address us. Temptation now, like painful labour and the sweat of the brow, has in secondary and derived aspects its points of interest, its uses of advantage, and even phases to ask admiration. But primarily, none of these things can be credited to it. We may be reminded
(4) that Satan is probably never far to seek or difficult to be found. Jesus is "led up of the Spirit into the wilderness," but not in consequence of any appointment with Satan to meet him. He is sure to be found.—B.
The first ordeal-temptation recorded of Jesus.
This reply of Jesus to the first temptation specially recorded as addressed to him by Satan is a quotation from Deuteronomio 8:1.—part of the language spoken by the lips of Moses, but dictated by the Spirit of God for the admonishment of his people. The words occur in that impressive review which Moses took of the career of the people whom he had led like a flock through the wilderness, when now the time was approaching for those wanderings to cease, and for the entrance into a land flowing with milk and honey.
In the review Moses makes particular reference to the apprehensions the people had suffered under of starvation amid their hunger in the wilderness; and he distinctly says God had permitted them to suffer hunger for the purpose of "humbling them, and proving them, and of knowing what was in their heart." A lesson, however, was to be learnt, not merely from their hunger, but also from the way in which it was to be removed.
When they should have first felt right well what hunger was, they were to be fed with a food which they knew not, nor their fathers before them. That unknown food was to teach them that human life does not depend exclusively on the known and seen, the touched and tasted and handled, but on the Word, the sovereign Word, of God; or, as it is more fully expressed elsewhere, "on every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
" This new food was in a double sense unknown, and the object of wonder to them; for they knew neither how nor whence it came, nor what it was when it had come. Perhaps it may seem rather remarkable that Jesus should put away and promptly reject the temptation by a mere quotation, and one found in such a comparatively humble connection. But we must remember, on the other hand, that it was little enough of a quotation, really speaking; it was little else than his own original language—Moses rather the person who quotes.
Meantime Jesus honours the Bible, reminding us how it is a storehouse of truths and principles, the application and practice of which it is ours to find. The temptation of Jesus is one of the deep things of his life, of Scripture, and even of our world. There is something in it which at present we fail, and are sure to fail, to compass. Be it so. There is also much in it that we can compass; much fraught with spiritual instruction and practical service for us.
Else it would not have been here, and in the very foreground of three out of the four Gospel narratives. There is often a little confusion in some people's minds as to the phrase, "a man is tempted;" for it does confessedly sometimes mean that a man feels working guiltily within him the temptation presented to him. But otherwise it strictly means, simply that the matter of temptation has been presented to him, been tried upon him, to its utmost power to influence or fascinate has sought to bewitch him; yet, perhaps, though it charmed never so wisely, charmed all in vain.
It is in this latter sense only that Jesus "was tempted." Whatever could smile after the manner of a tempting would smile on him; whatever could frown would frown; whatever could have the remotest chance of making his heart's perfect rectitude tremble but one moment like the needle to the pole, hovering one moment uncertain, tried its most subtle, but utterly in wain. Open as the heart of Jesus was beyond any other to all love, goodness, kindness, pain, it also resented more immediately and more thoroughly the faintest touch and impress of evil than any other nature.
This immediate resentment of the challenge of evil was what kept the soul of Jesus so free from a finger-mark's impress or soil; while some, detracting thereby from the meritoriousness of Christ's victory over temptations, have assumed that, because he resisted so immediately, it was the symptom of a stoical absence of feeling! Jesus Christ had just submitted to the baptism of water, and received that of the Holy Ghost. He was now to receive the baptism of temptation, while in no far distance awaited him that of blood and untold agony.
(A) Notice in the attack of this, the first of the three recorded temptations, that—
I. IT PURPORTED TO BASE ITS FORCE AND PLANT ITS ATTACK, IN FAITH OF THE WEAKNESS THAT LURKS IN BODILY APPETITE.
Jesus was prepared, presumably, not to resist and conquer, but rather to yield, by reason of being "a-hungered," and, if the expression be allowable, fiercely so. Compare the essence of this temptation with that presented to our first parents, which rested not on hunger, but on the attraction of indulgence and inviting, luscious food; again, with that of Esau; and with that of the Israelites.
II. SATAN APPEARS IN ORDER BY HUNGER TO TEMPT TO EVIL DISTINCTLY. When God tempted the Israelites by hunger, he did not tempt by evil, for hunger is not in itself any evil in the sense of being sinful; nor did he tempt to evil, for he would have been infinitely more pleased that the end of that tempting should have brought honour and confirmed strength to the people.
But in the present instance, while it is not Satan who makes Jesus "a-hungered," it is he who comes, in the day of Jesus' fierce hunger, to attempt what worst thing he can get out of that hunger.
III. THE POINT OF THE TEMPTATION LAY IN SUGGESTING AND SOLICITING THE SATISFYING OF A PERFECTLY INNOCENT APPETITE, BUT IN A MANNER AND BY A METHOD UNWORTHY OF JESUS. At the first blush of the thing, the evil feature in the temptation may not seem so patent. But the unerring eye unveils it at once.
1. Christ can do things which he nevertheless won't do. It is a reminder for us all that we have no right always to do the thing for which we may have the resources of abundant might. It is like a man saying, as men often have said, with as infinite wrongness to their own soul as supreme complaisance, that "he has a right to do what he likes with his own money"—a speech most infidel! We have no right to do what we "like," but only what's right!
2. Not only can Jesus do things he won't do, but also he won't do for himself what he will do for others. He can make stones bread; he can make stones cry out; he can make the stones of the temple walls utter forth his praise; he can out of stones raise up children to Abraham. But he will not command stones to become bread for himself; this, doubtless, the reason, that he will let faith, and patience, and bodily endurance, and the highest style of trust, have each its perfect work. Not to do so is to him, clearly and distinctly, sin.
3. When Satan now tempts Jesus through the appetite of the body, natural and innocent as the appetite was, there was something yet more natural to him, viz. to wait—to wait with trust; to wait, with perfect trust and perfect filial love, the great Father's time. He well knew him who fed Elijah by the raven; who fed also ravens and sparrows at all times; and for his feeding would he wait, Had Jesus on this occasion fallen back on his power for the behoof of himself, he might as well have done so again, and then again and again.
No longer would he have been suffering Man for and amongst us suffering men! No longer patient Man amongst us impatient; pattern Man amongst us who so needed such a Pattern! No longer would he have been One learning sympathy by fellow-experience and the sharing of our lot and our weakness! No; all the contrary; not a day but would have distanced him further from us, and increased most decisively our sense of isolation from his majestic self.
We should have felt overpoweringly how absolute our inability to be "like him." Painfully a-hungered, then, as Jesus was, the temptation was powerless, rebounding as the arrow from the rock; his strong fortitude builded partly at least on this foundation, "Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word which proceedeth out of the mouth of God."
(B) Notice in the answer of Christ to this, the first of the three temptations—.
II. THE SOURCE OR SECRET OF THIS DECISIVE PROMPTNESS. It was one simple and very imitable thing. It was the living, speaking Word of God that was in Christ. He knew that Word by memory, and in all the faith and love of his heart. And he knew it, not as a dead letter, but as a working, useful, trusty force.
III. THE METHOD OF THE ANSWER.
1. By the barest statement, and that in quotation, of the fallacy that the question of bread was a supreme question in man's life, he scouts that fallacy at once off the ground. It becomes ludicrously dwarfed to its just proportions, and it takes not a moment to do it. "Man lives not by bread alone."
2. By one suggestion of the right direction in which to look, he lays bare the very basis of the truth in that matter. Not only so, a whole vista of truth and thought seems to stand revealed. The creative, paternal Word seems to be heard proclaiming itself in its manifold, myriad tones of thoughtful, providing, loving care. And the omens of its future utterances seem to be caught.
Whatever we may think of our lives, and however little; however we may estimate, misestimate, use, misuse, or fail to use them; we live subject to "every word of God." The breathing of God is on our life. How will that Word some day reverberate in all our inner ear, and in all its new-born power to hear, which now finds in but our outer ear echoes often so hollow! Let us now open our most listening ear to it. Its burden is hope, promise, mercy, and eternal life.—B.
The second ordeal-temptation.
It is very naturally and universally supposed that the three temptations recorded here, as making their assault on Jesus, are typical of those to which human nature is exposed. All are exposed to temptations that come through the body, wide as is their range of variety. And therefore, probably, it was that this kind is exampled in the most generic instance and the simplest—one of hunger. According to this very supposable theory, we must expect to find the second temptation addressed to the nature of Jesus one that moves in a higher sphere, and not less generic in its type.
It evidently is so. It speaks not to the need of a body, but to the ambition of life, and of a higher sort of life—that, in one word, of power. Inadequate as this word is as an exhaustive description, yet perhaps it contains the essence of the matter in hand. Thought, active thought, and the very sense of energy, beg some exhibition of themselves. And as their first wonder of exercise is over matter, so they postulate some typical instance hereof.
No greater discipline, no severer chastisement, occurs in this world to life than its confinedness within the conditions of matter in general, and of the body in particular. And what may be called the mind's ambition is never more proudly gratified than in some leading instance of victory, or apparen victory, over the usual conditions of matter or of the human body itself. Notice, then—
I. THE INCIDENCE OF THIS TEMPTATION It may be set forth generally as above. More particularly,
(1) its subtleness;
(2) its special fascination for some temperaments;
(3) its plausibleness, as able to clothe itself with a shadow of greatness, and to redeem itself from the associations of low kinds of desire;
(4) its rapid and imperious habit of growth, may be enlarged upon. The wonderful lessons and examples the life and conduct of Jesus afford as to the safeguards that real power and necessary wielding of it require, may be pointed out.
Hence his own
(1) extremely conspicuous economy of miracle;
(2) his meekness most genuine;
(3) his perpetual resignation of, abnegation of, and even refusal in so many words of the offer of, the forms of power (that tinsel which is in many instances large part of the whole question), that come not merely as the fruit of influence over fellow-men, but of mastery over unconscious matter. Of the vanity of miracle, accordingly, and even of the vanity of might, there was not a trace in Jesus.
Satan then aimed this temptation within spiritual domain; within spiritual domain with which it is incontestable Jesus had of necessity great familiarity; and in one of the most seducing forms of it—for it was proposed that Jesus should instance himself as at one and the same time subject and object of an unwonted energy; and finally as one authorized to pose as the charmed of angels and the favourite of Heaven.
On the other hand, as the combatants in this temptation were only the two, without spectators, we do not think any part of the temptation consisted in the suggestion of a short and royal road to fame, and to the conviction of priests or people in the matter of the Messiahship of Jesus.
II. THE AGGRAVATION OF THE ATTACK AS DELIVERED IN QUOTATION OF SACRED, SCRIPTURE PROMISE, AND PROMISE MOST DIFFERENTLY DESIGNED.
Dwell on the odiousness of the presumption that wrests sacredest promises to the humble into the suggestion, the justification, the very plea for daring danger on the part of the proud and self-opinionate. Point this same thought by speaking of the deeper meaning of the promise. The angels' charge is to be understood, not merely as sovereign against great and surprising dangers and violent accident, but against the mere hurt of a mere foot against a mere stone.
Possibly note should be made also of the supposition that Satan borrowed the idea of couching his language of temptation in Scripture quotation from Christ's own use of quotation in repelling the first temptation.
III. THE REPLY OF JESUS TO THE TEMPTATION.
1. It is a genuine instance of retort.
2. It is pre-eminently short, conclusive, and unchallengeably absolute.
3. It puts for the first time, into words of the most forcible deliverance, the enormity of the act and the sin involved in an illegitimate, whether a careless or a reckless, challenging of the promises of God. These may be challenged, often enough are challenged, by deed rather than word; in the way they are thought of or calculated upon, far more than in the language used with respect to them.
And to do these things is to offer "to tempt God." God is not the proper Object of temptation at any time, under any circumstances. Man is the right object of God's temptations, which are right temptations and useful, and adapted by infinite capability of knowledge and wisdom; but the converse never.—B.
The third ordeal-temptation of Jesus.
The first temptation was aimed at Jesus in the matter of the appetite of the body. The second in that of the audacious ambition of a daring mind, whose pride of self and of thought would court every presumption whatsoever. The third is an immediate assault on the properly spiritual nature of man, which involves first of all conception of duty, of religion, and of its grandest presentation in commandment the first, for ever and ever the first! It "goes without saying" that no description more brief, comprehensive, true, addresses itself to the fixing of what it is that is amiss with man than this—that he forgets that he is estranged from his being's first glory, the worship of its Creator, Father, sovereign Owner, God.
And when this is well remembered, that one type of temptation should be recorded in this direction is what we should entirely expect. It may be held probable that the eighth verse goes a long way to give a satisfactory clue as to how far the details of the scenery of these temptations are to be read literally. It is plain that here they cannot be read so absolutely. None the less, in our opinion, is the groundwork in this case itself most real; in other words, we believe the scene was the summit of a high mountain, although even the narrowest exegesis of the expression "all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them," may be too wide for literal construing. Notice in the description of this temptation that—
I. IT BEGS THE VANTAGE-GROUND, THE ENHANCING CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE IMPRESSION, LENT BY ACTUAL SIGHT. That this kind of consideration may legitimately be set to the credit of Christ's combined nature is sufficiently shown by the numerous occasions in which we find such things as these—that his "tears," his "deep anger," his immeasurable "grief," reached their climax respectively when his eye actually "beheld" (the city), "saw" (her weeping, and the Jews also weeping which came with her), "looked round about" (upon them, being grieved, etc.). For those even who believe that the temptations of Jesus were conducted only in vision, the words "actual sight" may still have their meaning.
II. IT WENT DIRECT TO THE SUBSTANCE OF THE WORK WHICH BROUGHT CHRIST TO EARTH, THE SECURING OF THE KINGDOMS OF THIS WORLD.
To give what facility may be possible to any conception of the feasibility of Satan's fulfilling the offer of his tempting, we might imagine that he meant he would "give all the kingdoms," etc., in the sense of utterly retreating himself from the conflict; and from the endeavour, at present too successful, to win the world for his own. On the other hand, we know by what very different method, of the Passion and blood of Christ, the victory was to be won, and Satan to be dispossessed of his hold.
III. IT ASSERTS (Luca 4:6), WHAT CHRIST AT ALL EVENTS DOES NOT DENY OR CHALLENGE, A CERTAIN ABSOLUTE HOLD ON THE WORLD ON THE PART OF SATAN, AND BY SOME SORT OF RIGHT.
It is a thing supremely worthy of note that, in so small a compass as the description of the facts of the temptation, a place should thus be found for the recognition of a phenomenon so inscrutable, and so undeniably embedded in the facts of the world, in the statements of Scripture, and in the very grain of universal theology.
IV. IT PRESENTS ITSELF IN TEMPTATION'S ABSOLUTE, ESSENTIAL, FORM. The essential crucial question in all temptation of moral matter is this—Will a man bow down from himself, from his God, to worship untruth, to do the thing called sin, to honour the thing called evil, to act the thing called a lie, to worship Satan? These things, all mystery apart, arc to" worship." Satan, and not to "worship the Lord God."
V. IT GETS ITSELF ITS ANSWER, POSITIVE AND SWIFT. This twofold answer is revealed.
1. The instinctive resentment of the nature: "Get thee behind me, Satan!"
2. The unqualified confession of the philosophy of that resentment: "It is written," i.e. written in reason, in conscience, in the Word: "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve."—B.
The rest from temptation.
Remark on these representations of Scripture, and remark on them as the representations of Scripture, that—
I. THE THRICE-DENIED SATAN IS DAUNTED, AND LEAVES OFF AWHILE AT LEAST HIS TEMPTING. Contrast this with the thrice-denied Jesus (Luca 22:61), not then daunted, but with an intense love recalling Peter by a look.
II. THE NEED OF CHRIST WAS A REAL NEED. The "ministry" given now to him was probably in answer both to
(1) his bodily exhaustion by hunger, and
(2) his soul's weariness—a weariness not resulting from any supposed severity in the shape of struggle to overcome temptation, but from the" exceeding trouble" of the aspect of sin, of the presumptuous challenge of sin coming so near, and of the inevitable ruffle of perfect purity under the mere glare of the incarnation of impurity and evil.
III. THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS IS A FACT, AND THE KNOWN GRANT OF SUCH MINISTRY AT DIFFERENT TIMES TO MEN IS ALL THAT IS NOW PROFFERED TO CHRIST HIMSELF!
1. This instance of fact, with a hundred others, helps to corroborate our information as to the reality of Christ's humanity.
2. It is a fresh conviction for all of the watchful unforgettingness of supreme sympathy and divinest compassion.
3. It should greatly help to dignify our sense of the value and the adaptedness of the help and the solace vouchsafed to us, of the conflict, anxiety, vexation, and the irritation of a contact with the world, from which we should so often prefer to be saved, if things were left to our choice.
4. It may well be accepted as the expression and earnest of the calm after all storm is over, and the Divine feeding and succour after all work, trial, life's-length duty are laid down for the last time on earth.—B.
The extremes of light and darkness.
The interval between the place of this verse and the close of the three temptations is considerable, and is not evident from the passage before us. It is also even obscured by the order of the verses here. Much history belongs to the gap between Matteo 4:11 and Matteo 4:12. The seventeenth verse, as regards the matter of it, follows the twelfth.
That, again, begs the fuller explanations of Matteo 14:3; and lastly, after all the history of Jesus visiting the synagogue of that Nazareth "where he had been brought up," given us in Luca 4:16, the proper chronological place of our Luca 4:13 is found. The one chief fact of history revealed by these verses is to the intent that Jesus, for whatsoever reason, takes up his abode in Capernaum; and certainly one chief moral significance is exhibited as attaching to that fact, namely, that so far from being an enlightened place, or a little more enlightened haply than some others, it was in and of itself, as also of the announcement of signal prophecy, the head-quarters and metropolis of darkness.
The place wan dark, the district was dark, the people were dark—they even "sat in darkness." This spot was the principal residence of Jesus, this district the principal scene of his ministry, and "mighty works" and "gracious words." Notice in this prophetic announcement, now reduced to fact—
I. A SPLENDID ILLUSTRATION OF ONE LEADING METHOD FOLLOWED BY CHRISTIANITY FOR THE REGENERATION OF MANKIND. The Light comes to the darkness, though it take the darkness a long time to "comprehend" it.
II. A CONVINCING ILLUSTRATION OF THE GENUINELY CONDESCENDING CHARACTER OF THE FOUNDER AND EXEMPLAR OF CHRISTIANITY. The personal Light comes to those thick-covered and sunk in the very degradation of darkness, and endures patiently all the consequence.
III. A CONSUMMATE ILLUSTRATION OF THE THRILLING RESPONSIBILITY THAT GATHERS UPON MEN ON WHOM CHRISTIAN GIFT IS BESTOWED. Light itself is offered them—the light of
(1) correct information about themselves;
(2) correct instruction about their Help and Deliverer;
(3) perfect holiness and goodness;
(4) a perfect Example and Model;
(5) the unseen future and eternal. These are the things that make responsibility.—B.
The summons—to repent!
It would appear that while first John the Baptist uttered the summons, "Repent ye," when announcing the advent of "the kingdom of heaven" (Matteo 3:1), and while now Jesus himself does the same, the charge to utter it was not committed to "the twelve" (Matteo 10:7), nor to "the seventy" (Luca 10:9).
The reason, perhaps, is this, that the work of these disciples was intentionally didactic rather than dogmatic for the present, while all the weight of the solemn responsibility of appealing to men's souls and awakening them would strictly attach to the prophet John the Baptist, and to that "greater Prophet" "like unto him," Jesus. The text informs us, now at all events, that Jesus does not only teach but preach, does not only work mighty works, but demand a hearing for mighty appeals of a direct and personal nature, and practical results from them. Remark—
I. THE UNIQUE NOVELTY ONCE OF THIS SHORT, SHARP SUMMONS FROM THE SPEAKER'S STANDPOINT. The world knew many a "cry '' before this—perhaps never before one like this, except in the case of the older prophet-appeals, and those almost exclusively addressed to their own people.
Nevertheless, Noah's preaching to the old world, and Jonah's preaching to Nineveh, are fair samples of the real summons to men, on the rights of things, on eternal rights, to "repent." However, the present appeals of John the Baptist and of Jesus began the sound that was to travel the world round, to penetrate the densest Gentile masses, and never cease its reverberatings in human ear. We may remark distinctly
(1) upon the peculiar attitude of the man who thus addresses a fellow-man;
(2) upon the ground and warrant that he must claim for holding this attitude, if he does so rightly;
(3) upon the very serious responsibility that he ought to feel, and the "constraint laid upon him" lest he but usurp what does not belong to him;
(4) upon the unfeigned and deep dependence on unseen force he should feel and acknowledge. For in regard of all of these points it may be said that there is no assumption so great as that which is manifested when one man, facing his fellow-men, speaking into their ear, presumes to penetrate to all that is highest, deepest, most solemn, most enduring, in them and their soul, and commands them to "repent."
II. THE STRANGE SURPRISE OF IT ON THE EAR OF THE HEARER. The command itself is to altered thought, altered love, altered life and works. For:
1. It is the typical, the grandest interference with the individual's love, nature's instinct, habit's easy and determined leaning, and the universal world's pronounced preference, manifested all unequivocally in favour of the doctrine of laissez-faire.
2. It is all this, where it must needs be felt
(1) most penetratingly,—for each individual man is called on to set his own house in order;
(2) most sensitively,—for the house is that wherein his innermost self has its haunt;
(3) most comprehensively,—for outside and inside, what is most seen and most withdrawn from sight, have to be set in order; nay, diligent search and inquisition of self have to be made with pain, smart, sacrifice, self's denying, if the contemplated alteration, reformation, repentance, are really wrought.
3. It is all this, from a personal presence unambitious in its outer appearance, unimposing, untempting, and certainly unwinning.
III. A CERTAIN OSTENSIBLE GROUND UPON WHICH THE SUMMONS IS URGED. The ground may be called ostensible, but only for one reason—that by the vast majority it would be counted more ostensible than real. The eye that should see furthest, the thought that should pierce deepest and comprehend most, would well understand the genuineness, force, tellingness, of the plea, "For the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
" This announcement purported to describe in brief the more light, the purer light of knowledge now coming to earth; the clearer and the much more catholic revealing of the Father and his love to men, now to dawn on earth; and the more spiritual and inner methods by which justice, holiness, goodness, were to become the familiar study and search and possessions of humanity. The plea, therefore, is of the nature of inducement, The inducement is that which comes
(1) of new opportunity;
(2) of great encouragement in the fresh suggestions of the almighty Father's persevering watchfulness over his children on earth;
(3) of splendid prospect, when the methods that now should be were compared with past methods;
(4) of the suggestion of solemn added responsibilities, if vast increase of privilege were not responded to by increase of effort.—B.
The call of Christ to his first disciples.
In the light of what we read in Giovanni 1:38, we may regard the present passage as giving the account of the formal and final call of the four disciples named Peter, Andrew, James, and John. Note may also be taken of the circumstance that these four were all fishers. Notice—
I. THE CALL ITSELF IN THESE ORIGINAL EXAMPLES OF IT. And under this general head consider:
1. What it is in the essential meaning of it. The meaning is self's entire, willing, glad surrender to a new dominant love, to a new devoted life, and to these without end.
2. What it is in certain accidents of it.
(1) It is a great novelty as it falls on the ear of the person called. He has been called in a thousand other ways in life, but he hears himself now called to stand and surrender his deepest, realest self to a Person.
(2) It speaks great pretension as it passes the lip of the Person who utters it forth; and that pretension is just, will stand scrutiny and hold all its own.
(3) It is not futile; meets prompt obedience; and can afford to explain that obedience, as all its due, free from tyranny, free from jugglery, free from mere expedience, policy, or self-interest.
(4) It is a distinct proclamation of sovereignty on the part of him who calls, and of responsibility entailed on him who is called.
II. THE LANGUAGE IN WHICH THE CALL IS UTTERED FORTH. Show how utterly unprofessional, untechnical, inartificial; and yet more, how, while already simplest of the simple, even this borrows illustration—illustration from life's familiar scenery.
III. THE OCCASION UTILIZED FOR A CALL SO GREAT, SO EVENTFUL. It is an occasion when the man concerned is found in the most ordinary, perhaps unhonoured and unloved, labours of his work-day life.—B.
Early omens of the triple genius and functions of Christianity.
These three verses compress all the matter of three volumes, let the volumes be the largest that ever were. Or, again, they suggest to what periods of time, and to what devotion of labour in the life of Christ on earth, the paradoxical language of such a passage as Giovanni 21:25 looks not in vain for its ample justification. We have in the present verses the statement of what may be well regarded as early omens of the future achievements of Christ, of the Spirit of Christ, of the movement and force which he set going.
Numerous as these drops, they were still but the first drops of the universal shower, that should finally make the whole earth bring forth her full increase. The bare historic statements of these verses may be viewed as most significant omens of the genius and of the triple functions of Christianity. For—
I. IT TEACHES. It teaches in such senses as these following:
1. It arrests prevailing moral errors. Each several "beatitude" may be regarded as a leading and most conspicuous and literal illustration of this. Long-standing, long-grown, and closely grown moral misconceptions and eidola of human life and society it quietly strips off.
2. It offers positive truth; both of such things as unspoiled reason and pure philosophy and the cautiously studied lessons of human life and experience might of themselves point out, as well as of such things as belong to the sphere of genuine revelation.
3. This positive truth which it offers is of the moral distinctly, and therefore of the really and the for ever abiding. It is of the kind that belongs to the framework, not of the shorter life, our present rudiments of life, our present mental scope and horizon; but while touching, brightening, dignifying, all these growths and tributaries of life, it makes direct for the heart—that home of human life, that hearth of human nature, for which and round which all the rest whatsoever subsists.
II. IT PREACHES UNIQUE GOOD NEWS. The "gospel of the kingdom" is what it proclaims, first, last, and without end. That is, the good tidings of a new, unparalleled, unprecedented kingdom on earth; the kingdom of the kind known in heaven on earth. The sort of rule that characterizes the goodness, enlightenment, love, and willinghood of heaven comes to offer itself, and to make itself at home, on earth.
This rule had, perhaps, always been whispered of, had always been whispering itself, in men's better heart and moods; but now it is announced with emphasis, with authority, with Divine manifestation.
III. IT HEALS. Thus:
1. It leaves out no part of human nature, disdains no interest of the present form of human life. The body is a most veritable element in every calculation of human nature. None but the shallowest and most artificial philosophy will leave it out of the reckoning. Scripture does not leave it out. As the work of God, and a masterpiece of organization, its effectiveness, health, comfort, are honoured by Christianity.
2. It compassionately regards all the variety of the sickness, infirmity, and deeper disease of the human body. The miracles of Christ prefigure (and only in miniature, miracles though they were) all the wide ameliorative influence of Christianity down through the ages. The miracles of Christ honour God's work, the marvellously made and curiously wrought body of man, as well as subserved the present comfort of those who lived in his time, and prefigured the impulse that should be given by the Spirit of Christ to the beneficent growth of science.
3. It is its own witness. And this it is still. This it will ever increasingly be. For all that it avails for the body, it will speak its own worth. For all that it does for mind and soul, it wins, and will ever win, its own triumphs. It begs no favour. It begs nothing but what its merit imperially demands.—B.
HOMILIES BY MARCUS DODS
The temptation of Jesus.
In his baptism our Lord was proclaimed as the Messiah. This must have intensified his feeling of the burden and glory of his vocation. A ferment of emotions must have been stirred in his soul. The inquisitive, critical eyes around him, the eager questioning to which he must straightway have been subjected, the necessity of determining what course he should pursue, made solitude a necessity for him at this time.
He must ascertain with definiteness the principles which are to guide his work. And the great problems which presented themselves as he looked forward to his work were these: What use may I make of the powers committed to me? What means may I legitimately use to convince the people? What kind of Messiah am I to be? His mind had to work itself clear of all popular fallacies regarding the coming kingdom, and his heart had to face and count the cost of all that would come of resisting or disappointing popular expectations.
Rejecting, therefore, the idea that he might use his miraculous power for his own comfort, he affirmed from the first the principle that he lived and worked for others. Rejecting the idea that he was to be a mere Wonder-worker, he at once adopted the slow way of moral influence and waiting on God's time. And, thirdly, rejecting the idea that he might be an earthly Prince, he from the outset sustained the role of a spiritual King.
I. THE TEMPTATION TO USE HIS MIRACULOUS POWER FOR HIS OWN SUSTENANCE AND COMFORT. Absorbed during all these days in thought and mental conflict, the claims of intense bodily hunger at last make themselves felt.
He finds himself faint, far from any dwelling where he could get food; ready to perish, and too giddy, sick, and spent to seek for relief. But he carries in his own Person the power to turn the very stones of the untilled hillside into bread. Why should he not use this power? Because he has taken the nature of man, to live a human life under human conditions, and were he to relieve himself of every threatening danger and evade every difficulty by a quick appeal to his supernatural power, this entrance into human life would be a mockery.
His freedom from sin would have been no example to us if the danger and discomfort of resisting sin and living righteously were only in appearance. (Compare the chapter in 'Ecce Homo,' on Christ's credentials: "This temperance in the use of supernatural power is the masterpiece of Christ. It is a moral miracle superinduced upon a physical one … The kind of life he prescribed to his followers he exemplified in the most striking way, by dedicating all his extraordinary powers to beneficent uses only, and deliberately placing himself for all purposes of hostility and self-defence on a level with the weakest.
") Every young man looking forward to his career should bring himself to the measure here presented. I have certain gifts, means, capabilities, by which I can secure comfort and position in the world. For whose benefit am I to use what I have? He would be a fool who feared to bid every young man choose as Christ chose. You foresee discomfort, the obscure and dingy ways of poverty; you foresee what you would sum up in one word, "starvation.
" But choose as Christ chose, and though you may make what men will call a very poor thing of life, or lose it, you will find life eternal. Let no parent be so ill a counsellor as to turn away a son from generous self-sacrifice. Every man has his time of temptation; and once committed to certain courses of choice, is hampered.
II. THE TEMPTATION TO WIN THE PEOPLE BY AN ASTOUNDING FEAT. The vulgar seemed to expect that the Messiah would leap from a pinnacle of the temple. And now that Jesus was proclaimed, how could he more readily win the people's assent to his claims? He had not been in a hurry to proclaim himself, but now something must be done.
The leap had no horror for Jesus; had it been warranted, he would not have feared it. It was an easy method compared to the tedious instruction; the slow, disappointing appeal to right feeling; the weary ministry he actually chose. How often must this temptation have returned when he met stupid, prejudiced, contemptuous people! How easy to refute their accusations by stupendous miracle! But to work a miracle merely to show that he had the power, to give a sign to those who merely asked for a sign, Christ constantly refused. His miracles had always another motive and a real occasion.
Miracles did convince men of his Messiahship, but only when they saw that the miracles were dictated by loving consideration of the actual necessities of the men about him. And suppose such a leap, or any other such marvel, had been the manifestation of God! How feeble, how incongruous a testimony! Shall we ourselves take the quick road or the slow one? Shall we force God's providence? Are we to make opportunities for ourselves, or to wait till God gives us occasion? Shall we expect God's help when we have not used the ordinary means for escaping from danger or attaining our object (not used the stair to get down from the pinnacle)? We tempt God when we neglect the ordinary means.
III. THE TEMPTATION TO BE AN EARTHLY, NOT A SPIRITUAL KING. No one ever felt so much capacity to govern well, to reform social abuses, to lift a people to the pinnacle of glory. He felt in himself a power he must have longed to exercise for men's temporal welfare.
Satan whispered, "You have come to bind men in a universal brotherhood, but it is hopeless to effect this by acting on men individually and spiritually. Men do not care to be delivered from sin; they do not wish to be led back to God, and you will never make the world what you wish it. But make an earthly kingdom for yourself; that is possible; no mere shadowy imagination. The people are now waiting for a leader who will throw off for them the Roman yoke, and lead them to dominion.
" We know this temptation in its petty appeals to our avarice or love of display, to our hankering after posts of influence, to our desire to be known. We know it also when we wish Christ had provided for his people earthly good as well as spiritual. Nothing but a preference for what is spiritual will secure us against the temptation to wish, either for ourselves or others, what constitutes the glory of this world.
USES.
1. Temptation is possible without sin. Until the will consents, sin is not committed. Our Lord was tempted, yet without sin.
2. The depth and reality of our Lord's humiliation. His ability to sympathize is founded on his being of one nature with us, and living a life unsheltered from the temptations which assail us.—D.
Call of the fishermen.
I. THE OCCASION OF THE CALL. Driven from Nazareth, our Lord repaired to the busy western shore of the Sea of Galilee. Through this district ran the great caravan-roads; and several important towns gathered all kinds of tradesmen. Herod the tetrarch had his court in Tiberias. The valuable fishings in the lake gave employment to many.
Courtiers, soldiers, tax-gatherers, watching the caravans and fisheries, fishermen, women reputable and disreputable, filled the shore with movement and life. Crowds were readily attracted by the new Teacher. And our Lord, seeing the fields thus white to harvest, recognized that the time was come for selecting labourers to reap.
II. OBJECT OF THE CALL. "I will make you fishers of men." The fishermen would not at once see what he meant by this. Knowing that he was founding a kingdom, they may have supposed he would make them a kind of recruiting officers to assist him in enlisting others, as he had enlisted them. But his purpose was clear to himself; and what he here did as if casually was carefully deliberated. He meant to form a society coextensive with humanity and lasting as the world.
He meant to introduce into every nation a new religion. He meant to convert all men to his own way of looking at things. And he was resolved to accomplish this purpose, not by committing his ideas to a book which could be verified as his to all time, and from which each generation might receive unadulterated his very ideas, but by means of living men, who by word of mouth should tell men about himself and his kingdom, and by their life show what a Christian is.
To accomplish this great object they were to cast their net and to angle. They were to study men's ways and habits, to circumvent and gently constrain them, to wile and attract them to their own good, to show the untiring patience, skill, and study of professional fishermen. God is the great Fisher of men, patiently accommodating himself to the suspicious, intractable ways of the sinner, playing him and humouring him, but ever drawing him onwards towards himself. Note our wild rushes back to freedom, our sullen retreat under the cold stone of doubt, our petulant refusal to be led on. Compare, too, the parable of the net.
III. THE PERSONS CALLED. Everywhere the world was preoccupied by religions rooted in centuries of tradition and national memories, by philosophies buttressed by great and cherished names, by venerable institutions and local prejudices. To what kind of men will Jesus commit the exceptionally arduous enterprise of establishing his own kingdom as supreme over all? Nicodemus, the Pharisee of position? The instructed scribe who sought to follow him? The grateful nobleman whose child he had saved from death? He turns for help to quite another class.
One of the earliest called was a publican: as if some modern reformer should secure the help of an actor or a tavern-keeper. This choice at once brought on him a storm of indignation. But he had no misgivings. He knew these fishermen were ignorant, and would easily be foiled in argument by a clever scribe. But they had the one essential requisite of thorough attachment to him. He knew them also as disciples of John, sober, God-fearing men, who were waiting for the kingdom.
IV. IMMEDIATE RESULT OF THE CALL. "They immediately left the ship and their father, and followed him." They were to be fitted for their work of preaching Jesus by knowing him thoroughly. For this purpose they must live with him, and see how he works, and learn his mind and method. They must leave that glittering pile of fish they were already calculating the value of; they must leave their accustomed way of winning their daily bread; they must abandon their father, and go where Jesus went.
The physical following of Jesus which was required of the apostles is not required of all Christians; but all Christians are required to love Christ above all, and to accept his will as supreme law.
V. ENCOURAGEMENT GIVEN TO THE CALLED. Luke relates that our Lord stimulated the faith of these fishermen by a miraculous draught of fishes (Luca 5:1). This helped them to take the step he invited them to take.
1. For it showed them he could provide for them. Does not our refusal to listen to the call of Christ, and unflinchingly follow where he leads, arise chiefly from the fear that by so doing worldly loss of one kind or other (pleasure, advancement, gain, comfort, renown) will be occasioned us? This miracle reminds us that Christ can easily give us more than all self-seeking toil of our own can achieve.
2. But the miracle encouraged them to believe he could make them fishers of men. If in their own calling he could give them successes they could not for themselves achieve, much more would he ensure their success in the calling which was peculiarly his own. He confirmed his promise by a symbol which spoke volumes to them. And when we shrink from duties to which we are plainly called, it is encouraging to remember that our Lord, who calls us to them, can give us success where all professional skill would avail us nothing.—D.
HOMILIES BY J.A. MACDONALD
The temptation.
This appears to have extended through the forty days of the sojourn of Jesus in the wilderness. Mark says, "He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan" (Marco 1:13). The text describes only the acme at the close of the forty days. It is given as a specimen of the wiles of Satan, and forms an epitome of all the temptations he has ever contrived. From it we learn—
I. THAT SATAN IS ARMED WITH FORMIDABLE POWERS.
1. Probably he appeared in an assumed shape.
(1) For he appeared to the manhood of Christ. He is introduced as "the tempter," but not named. Jesus did not give him his name until the tempter had fully discovered himself as the god of this world (verse 10).
(2) This was not the only instance in which Satan assumed a disguise. He tempted Eve under the form of a serpent. After the fall he enshrined himself in men. Demoniacs. Some suppose that Satan appeared to Jesus in the character of a scribe, as he appealed to the Scriptures. He "fashioneth himself into an angel of light" (cf. Zaccaria 3:1; 2 Corinzi 11:14).
(3) Beware of the devil in disguises. In men: "One of you hath a devil." In good men: Peter (Matteo 16:23).
2. Probably he literally transported the body of Jesus.
(1) Jesus was in "the wilderness." Certainly not a rural wilderness in the vicinity of Bethabara; for he was in solitude, and "with the wild beasts" (Marco 1:13). The presumption, then, is that it was "the wilderness of the people;" for what other could be distinguished as "the wilderness"? Analogy also suggests the desert of Sinai, for there Moses and Elijah also had "fasted forty days" (cf. Esodo 34:28; 1 Re 19:8).
(2) Thus, then, the "prince of the powers of the air" would have hurried the body of Jesus, as in an elemental chariot, over an interval of two hundred and fifty British statute miles, in order to "set him on the pinnacle of the temple." Philip was carried by the Spirit of God from the desert of Gaza to Azotus (Atti degli Apostoli 8:39; see also 1 Re 18:12; 2 Re 2:16; Ezechiele 3:11).
(3) From the holy city Satan then carried Jesus away to the summit of "an exceeding high mountain." Could this have been that "high mountain" upon which the Transfiguration afterwards took place? It is noteworthy that, in the Transfiguration, with Jesus appeared in glory Moses and Elias, who, like him, had fasted (Matteo 17:1). If Hermon was that mountain, then about a hundred miles would have been traversed. If Nebo, whence Moses viewed the promised land, then about twenty-five, miles.
(4) With such an adversary it is obviously our wisdom never to contend single-handed. We have the promised help of God. With all our armour we should be armed with "all prayer" (Efesini 6:13).
3. He wrought wonderfully upon the imagination of Jesus.
(1) This must have been so, if, as some suppose, Jesus had been simply carried by Satan mentally from the wilderness to the holy city, and from thence to Hermon or some other eminence.
(2) But from the mountain summit he certainly wrought wonderfully' upon the imagination of Jesus when he "showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them." Luke adds, "in a moment of time." Such a view of the tetrarchies of Palestine as could be obtained from Nebo or any other mountain summit scarcely comes up to the description, "all the kingdoms of the world," or "all the kingdoms of the inhabited earth" (see Luca 4:5, Greek). The panoramic effect Wrought by Satan upon the phantasy of Jesus was wonderful.
(3) Herein we are warned never to cherish an evil imagination. If we yield ourselves to the power of such a master of image-working we place ourselves at the mercy of the impersonation of cruelty.
II. THAT SATAN WIELDS HIS ENERGIES WITH SUBTLETY.
1. He selects a wilderness as the theatre of his operations.
(1) A wilderness, in the natural sense, is a wild, uncultivated waste. Such certainly was the desert of Sinai. In the metaphorical sense it is a state of mental solitude, depression, perplexity, or suffering.
(2) In such a state Satan finds us at a disadvantage, and then plies his arts with vigour. When the spirit is bruised he would excite in us rebellious thoughts of God and harsh thoughts of men.
2. He practises adroitly upon our necessities.
(1) Our Lord was "an hungered," and Satan tempted him to supply his need by supernatural means. If he finds us an hungered he may tempt us to supply our need by illicit means. He would have us justify thievery under the plea of necessity.
(2) The temptation is to distrust Providence. That Providence cannot lack resources which fed a nation in the wilderness for forty years. Angels in due time ministered to Jesus—brought him food (cf. 1 Re 19:4).
(3) "Man does not live by bread alone." The animal part of the man lives on bread; the nobler part of the man is nourished by faith in the Word of God. The spirit must not be starved in unbelief to supply the wants of the body. Be that feeds the soul will feed the body also (Matteo 6:33).
3. He turns our weapons against us.
(1) If we say, "It is written," Satan also will say, "It is written." He will take care to put his own interpretation upon the Scripture he quotes. Therefore we must say, "It is written again." To do this we must study the Scriptures. The Scriptures are the best interpreters of themselves. To the comparison of spiritual things Satan has no answer. Ignorance is danger.
(2) If we profess to trust in God, Satan will tempt us to trust in our faith alone. "Cast thyself down: for it is written," etc. He would push our confidence to the extreme of presumption.
4. He "bids up" for the soul of the good.
(1) He will, if possible, subvert us with trifles. Satan has a malignant pleasure in vanquishing and destroying us with trifles.
(2) Where trifles will not serve, he bids higher. To Christ he offered "all the kingdoms of the world." The bribe which Christ refused Antichrist accepts (cf. Apocalisse 13:2, Apocalisse 13:4, Apocalisse 13:8).
(3) Every man has not his price. There have been those who have laid down their lives for the truth. The race of the martyrs is not extinct.
III. THAT GOD SUPERINTENDS THE CONFLICTS OF HIS SAINTS.
1. He strengthens them for the battle.
(1) "This is my beloved Son Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit," etc.
(2) So the Transfiguration, wherein the pores of the body of Jesus were avenues for the streaming glory, was preparatory to that ordeal of agony in Gethsemane, wherein the same pores became the avenues for his blood.
(3) In your conflicts remember your baptisms. "Do not question the validity of your baptism because it was succeeded by a fierce temptation" (Dr. Parker).
2. He permits temptations for gracious ends.
(1) Christ was Divine, therefore invulnerable. Why, then, was he "led up of the Spirit" to be tempted? For our benefit. That he might be our Exemplar.
(2) Temptations are our educators. Who can grow in patience, in long-suffering, in courage, without trial?
3. He retains Satan under his control.
(1) Satan was permitted to convey Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple (Alford supposes this to have been the royal portico of Herod, overlooking at a fearful height the valley of Jehoshaphat). Satan was not permitted to push him over. He was permitted to convey Jesus to the summit of the mountain. He was restrained from dashing his foot against a stone.
(2) The will of God, as a chain, limits and restrains the evil one. This Satan confesses (cf. Luca 4:6). Remarkable illustrations of this principle are furnished in the history of Job (Giobbe 1:12; Giobbe 2:6).
(3) That will is defined in the promises for our confidence and comfort (see 1 Corinzi 10:13; Ebrei 2:18).
4. He gives final victory to the faithful.
(1) The "forty days" of our Lord's temptation in the Wilderness correspond to the "forty years" of Israel's pilgrimage. This is evident from the allusion to the manna (cf. verses 1-4 with Deuteronomio 8:3). Both may be taken as representing the pilgrimage of life.
(2) As the temptation became fierce at the close of the forty days, so may we expect fierce assaults towards the close of our pilgrimage.
(3) But Satan will leave us at death. "Then," viz. at the end of the forty days. "Then," viz. when Jesus resolutely avowed his complete devotion to God—"the devil leaveth him."
(4) The rout. of Satan is the signal for the ministry of angels. With a convoy of angels the victorious Spirit ascends to heaven.—J.A.M.
Light in darkness.
The public work of Christ followed upon his temptation. "No man can be prepared for any deep vital work in the world who has not come through the devil's school" (Dr. Parker). Let no truth-seeker be dispirited by the severity of his temptations. Consider here—
I. THE MELANCHOLY CONDITION OF THE CHRISTLESS.
1. They sit in darkness.
(1) What a miserable picture! The felon in his dismal dungeon. The traveller benighted in a craggy wild.
(2) Such morally is the condition of the "Gentiles." Shrouded with the triple night of ignorance, superstition, vice. "Galilee of the Gentiles." Twenty cities of Galilee were given by Solomon to Hiram (1 Re 9:11). Though these were twenty years later restored to Solomon, the Phoenicians would still largely mingle with the Jews there (2 Cronache 8:2).
The Cuthaeans with whom Shalmaneser replaced the Israelites taken into captivity stocked Galilee as well as Samaria proper (2 Re 17:24). Though under the Maccabees the Jews subdued the Cuthaeans, they did not expel them. "The way of the sea" was a high-road from Syria into Egypt, and Strabo had reason to say that this country was inhabited by Egyptians, Arabians, and Phoenicians.
(3) The Jews in general, and those of Galileo in particular, were woefully degenerate at the time of Christ's coming (Giovanni 1:5). There is no deeper darkness than that of apostasy.
2. Their darkness is the "shadow of death."
(1) The death of perdition is called "outer darkness." Those involved in it are shut out permanently from the holy universe.
(2) The "shadow" of death is the dominion or influence of the infernal world. It is a synonym for the "power of Satan" (Atti degli Apostoli 26:18). The expression is used for the grave, and for the obscure abodes of the departed spirits of the wicked. The state of sin is the very gloom of hell upon earth (comp. Salmi 91:1 with Salmi 107:14).
II. THE SUFFICIENCY OF CHRIST AS A SAVIOUR.
1. life is the Messiah of prophecy.
(1) His appearance in Galilee was ignorantly used to discredit this (see Giovanni 7:41, Giovanni 7:52).
(2) Yet the appearance of Messiah in Galilee was the very thing the prophets required. Matthew cites Isaiah to this effect. Mode refers the first four or five words of the ninth chapter of Isaiah to the last verse of the chapter preceding. In this he is in agreement with the Chaldee Paraphrast and Jerome. He translates the prophet thus: "According as the first time he made vile (or debased) the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali; so in the latter times he shall make it glorious.
" Then follow the words quoted by Matthew, "The way of the sea by Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles,'' etc. No prophecy of Christ is clearer than this of Isaiah (Isaia 9:1), and it requires that "Galilee" should be the place of his ministry.
(3) Jesus accordingly was brought up at Nazareth, and afterwards resided principally at Capernaum. In Galilee the principal events of his ministry occurred. His birth, indeed, was at Bethlehem of Judah, and his death at Jerusalem, which also agreed to the requirements of prophecy.
2. The Messiah of prophecy is the Saviour of men.
(1) His presence brings light. "The heathen writers," says Eisner, "represented the arrival of some great public benefactor in a place, as a new light sprung up in the midst of darkness." John was a "burning and shining light," but he burned and shined in the fire and light of Christ. Herod imprisoned John, but he could not imprison John's light. No tyrant can imprison sunbeams. He may shut them out; he cannot shut them in.
(2) His light brings life. He shows the way of life. His teaching brings with it the energy of life (Giovanni 1:4). His illumination is salvation (Atti degli Apostoli 13:47);
(3) He is the Saviour of the whole world. His light is not limited to the Jew, though his mission was first to the Jew (Matteo 15:24). He went to Capernaum "that it might be fulfilled," etc. This is one of those passages which Lord Bacon says, "have a germinant accomplishment.'' An instalment was fulfilled when Jesus exercised his ministry in Galilee. That ministry there was also a presage of what will yet occur when the "whole earth shall be filled with his glory."
III. THE TERMS OF HIS SALVATION.
1. The first thing is repentance.
(1) The source of true repentance is conviction of sin. This comes to us through the shining of the light of Divine truth. "That which maketh manifest is light." The conscience is rendered sensitive by the quickening beams of Divine truth.
(2) The evidences of a true conviction of sin are
(a) sorrow for sin,
(b) confession of sin,
(c) forsaking of sin.
(3) If we refuse the light it will leave us. Jesus left Nazareth because the people there rejected him. After his temptation Jesus went from Judaea into Galilee (Giovanni 1:43; Giovanni 2:1). Thence he returned to Judea to celebrate the Passover (Giovanni 2:13). Then he baptized in Judaea, while John baptized at AEnon (Giovanni 3:22, Giovanni 3:23).
After the imprisonment of John, Jesus returned to Nazareth. Here the people rejected his testimony and sought to kill him. So he left them (Luca 4:16, Luca 4:29). Beware how you trifle with the Light of life.
(4) Let Capernaum know the day of her visitation. Else, "exalted to heaven" by the presence of Christ, she may be "thrust down to hell" by his absence. Privileges bring responsibilities. The brightest blessings, by misimprovement, are converted into the blackest curses.
2. This repentance is in prospect of the kingdom.
(1) The kingdom of heaven here is the gospel dispensation as opposed to the Mosaic.
(2) It is, moreover, the faithful acceptance of the gospel as opposed to the preparatory repentance. Otherwise it is the perfecting of repentance in faith. Faith is here preached, though the term is not used.
(3) Furthermore, the kingdom of heaven here is hearty submission to the rule of Christ;
(a) in the heart (Luca 17:21);
(b) in the life;
(c) at any cost. Jesus took up the preaching of John when John was cast into prison.
It is Christ-like to be baptized for the dead.
(4) Jesus adopted the dispensation of John as "the beginning of his gospel". There is no true Christian faith without repentance and reformation.—J.A.M.
The ministerial vocation.
The Sea of Galilee, on the shore of which Jesus walked, was an inland lake of about six miles broad and seventeen long. It was surrounded by a varied scenery of mountain and valley, amidst which were embosomed several populous villages and towns. Henceforth this region was destined to become the theatre of many a wonderful history. The history before us invites attention to a vocation, a voice, and persons called.
I. THE VOCATION.
1. The call was to the Christian ministry.
(1) The persons now called were already disciples of Jesus. They were, in the first instance, disciples of John, and upon John's testimony to Jesus they accepted Jesus as the Christ of promise (see Giovanni 1:35). John does not mention the name of the second disciple of the Baptist who followed Jesus, which is presumption that it was himself. Nor does he tells us how, doubtless, he brought his brother James, as Andrew brought his brother Simon.
(2) The call here, then, was not to piety, but to work. Some call to holy service has come to you. Have you heeded it? Have you discerned in it the voice of Jesus? Have you neglected it?
(3) Hitherto their discipleship was consistent with secular business. They were with Jesus at Cana. They accompanied him to Jerusalem, and were with him in Judaea. Yet they kept hold of their trade.
(4) Now they are to be separated from the secular.
(a) They have to forsake their property. They left their nets and boats by which they had their living.
(b) They have to sacrifice their worldly prospects. Simon and Andrew, when called, had their nets in the sea; but they did not wait to haul them in. The call of Christ to work for him, like the call of death, breaks the thread in the shuttle before the piece is woven.
(c) They have to renounce the comforts and endearments of home. They left their father and the servants (cf. Matteo 8:19; Luca 14:26, Luca 14:27).
2. The call was a promotion from the secular to the spiritual.
(1) The fishermen are to become "fishers of men." Their business henceforth is to be with men—rational, emotional, immortal, God-like men. How much is a man better than a fish?
(2) Their employment henceforth is to be eminently beneficent. Their fishing is not to be the gaining of a living by the death of God's creatures. It is to save the precious life of men by bringing them out of the waters of worldliness. It is to transfer them from an element foreign to their true nature, and brighten them with the congenial prospects of a blissful eternity.
(3) Note: ministers of Christ are out of their calling when they fish for wealth. Though the Lord hath ordained that they that preach the gospel should live of it, the minister who makes merchandise of his office proves himself to be a hireling (cf. 2 Corinzi 12:14; Ebrei 13:17).
3. It was a call to holy association.
(1) In the first place, a more intimate and constant association with Jesus. If ministers have not closer communion with Christ than other persons the fault is their own. Their very profession brings them into the closest relations to him, as they lead the devotion of the Churches, and carry the messages of God to men. The message of the true minister is not simply from the written Word, but, in the written Word, from the living God.
(2) It is also a call to ministerial brotherhood. Here we have the disciples called in couples. So when Jesus sent them forth to preach he sent them in company—"two and two" (Luca 10:1). Twelve of them were constituted into a college of apostles.
(3) The religion of Christ is eminently social. Disciples congregate in Churches. Churches congregate into a universal Church. This "Church of the Firstborn" is associated with "an innumerable company of angels" (Ebrei 12:22, Ebrei 12:23).
II. THE VOICE.
1. It is a voice of authority.
(1) The words are peremptory and without preamble. Follow me; literally, "Come behind me." It is the same voice that said, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden." The same that said, "Lazarus, come forth!"
(2) The words are inspiriting. "And I will make you fishers of men." Here already the "kingdom of heaven is likened unto a net" (Matteo 13:47). "Fishers of men" (cf. Geremia 16:16; Ezechiele 47:8). Memorably fulfilled (see Atti degli Apostoli 2:41).
(3) Those who follow Christ take a difficult way. The example is high. Yet the way is made easy, viz. by his companionship, guidance, help.
2. The authority of the voice is certified.
(1) The claims of Jesus are the highest. He claims to be Messiah. Immanuel. But here is no presumption.
(2) He has the seal of prophecy. Born at the right juncture, when the Roman power was at its zenith (Daniele 2:44). Born in the right place, Bethlehem of Judah (Michea 5:2). Brought up out of Egypt (Osea 11:1). A resident of Nazareth (Giudici 13:5; 1 Samuele 1:11). The Prophet of Galilee (Isaia 9:1). Had the testimony of Elijah (cf. Malachia 4:5; ch. 11:13, 14).
(3) He had already wrought many miracles. He had turned the water into wine at Cana. He had read the heart-secrets of Simon, of Nathanael, of the woman of Samaria. He had wrought "signs" at the Passover in Jerusalem (Giovanni 2:23). He had healed a nobleman's servant at Capernaum.
(4) Have you duly considered the authority of that voice of Jesus which hath called you to his service? Have you duly weighed the responsibility of refusing him that speaketh from heaven (Ebrei 12:25)?
III. THE PERSONS CALLED.
1. They were not men of rank.
(1) Social rank is much esteemed by men. "Have any of the rulers believed on him, or of the Pharisees?" was the confident question of the unbelieving Pharisees (Giovanni 7:47-43). Had Jesus followed the wisdom of this world, he would have enlisted the rabbis.
(2) He makes the weak things of the world to confound the mighty. "On the humble shoemaker's bench Carey laid the foundation of the British Baptist Missions. John Newton found in his congregation an unfriended Scotch boy, whose soul was then aglow with new-born love to Christ. He took him to John Thornton, one of those noble merchants whose wealth, whose piety, and whose beneficence increased together.
They educated him; and that boy became Claudius Buchanan, whose name India will bless when the names of Clive and Hastings are forgotten. John Bunyan was a gift of poverty to the Church. Zwingle came forth from an Alpine shepherd's cabin; Melancthon, from an armourer's workshop; Luther, from a miner's cottage; the apostles, some of them, from fishermen's huts" (Dr. J. Harris).
2. But they were men of character.
(1) They were religious men.
(a) Disciples of the Baptist. Therefore repentant as to sin, expectant as to salvation.
(b) Disciples of Jesus. Those are welcomed to the joys of faith who have been disciplined to repentance.
(2) They were industrious men. Jesus found them busy at their callings. Christ does not want louts for ministers. Some of them were letting down their nets; others were mending theirs. Ministers are best employed either in preaching or in study.
(3) They were men of decision. Jesus called. "Straightway"—"immediately," they responded. They had something to lose. They did not hesitate to lose it. They lost nothing. They gained everything.—J.A.M.
The ministry of Jesus.
Though he had called out workers he did not cease himself to work. In all holy ministries Jesus is the Worker. He exercised his personal ministry chiefly in "Galilee." This was in pursuance of prophecy (Isaia 9:1).
I. HIS GOSPEL CAME IN WORD. "Teaching … preaching."
1. He taught in synagogues.
(1) We may admire the providence that prepared the synagogue. Synagogues, as some think, originated about the time of the Babylonish captivity. (Salmi 74:8). Others give them a more venerable antiquity, associating and identifying them with the proseuchē or open groves, from the earliest times used as oratories, or places for prayer (cf.
Esodo 3:1; Jos 24:26; 2 Cronache 1:3; Luca 6:12; Atti degli Apostoli 16:13).
(2) Jesus availed himself freely of the liberty to teach afforded in these. They were, "places of concourse," in which it was proper "Wisdom should lift up her voice" (Proverbi 1:21). The people accustomed to assemble in them would be educated to listen. The reading of the Scriptures in them afforded a fine opportunity for introducing the message of the gospel. We should be quick to improve providential facilities.
(3) The disciples of Jesus followed his example in using synagogues. The result was, in many cases, that synagogues became gradually converted into Christian churches (Giacomo 2:2). The forms of worship were generally continued, only with the addition of the Supper of the Lord. Merciful are the destructions effected by conversion.
2. He preached in the open air.
(1) In this Jonah was his type (Giona 3:2 Giona 3:4). Jesus might have issued a proclamation. He "went about" in person through the two hundred cities and towns of Galilee. His interest in our welfare is deep and earnest (cf. ch. 5:1; 10:27; 11:1).
(2) He proclaimed his kingdom.
(a) "The kingdom." That with which no earthly kingdom can compare. Supreme in splendour. Destined to survive all others.
(b) The kingdom of grace. "Gospel"—glad tidings. The original name for our religion. Whoever receives it proves it to be so. "The gospel is the charter of that kingdom, containing the King's coronation oath, by which he graciously obliges himself to pardon, protect, and save his subjects. It contains also their oath of allegiance, by which they oblige themselves to observe his statutes and seek his honour" (Henry).
(c) The passage through the kingdom of grace into the kingdom of glory.
II. HIS GOSPEL CAME WITH POWER.
1. He healed all that he met with.
(1) The skill of the most accomplished physicians is baffled by particular diseases. No malady resisted the power of Christ. He cured the chronic, the acute, the intolerable.
(2) His cures were complete. No miracle of Christ was ever called in question by those who witnessed it. Some were malicious enough to ascribe the miracles he wrought to Satan, but their reality was confessed (cf. Matteo 11:4, Matteo 11:5; Giovanni 3:2; Giovanni 5:36).
2. He healed all that were brought to him.
(1) Amongst these were the epileptic. The word translated "lunatic" does not describe mental disorder, but a bodily disease on which the moon was supposed to exercise periodical influence (cf. Matteo 17:15). Our Revisers, accordingly, render the term by "epilepsy." Paralysis also owned his power. So likewise spasmodic torments.
(2) These typical maladies may be taken as descriptive of typical moral evils. The miracles evinced the power of the Worker to remove also the corresponding moral maladies.
(3) Those who hear the fame of Jesus should come to him for spiritual healing. Those who have experienced his healing power should invite their neighbours to the Healer.
3. Even the devils were subject to him.
(1) Demons amongst the heathen were not generally evil, but, in their estimation, good spirits, whom they worshipped as gods. Amongst the Jews the term was restricted to evil spirits.
(2) Evil spirits actually possessed human beings. So far from demoniacs being simply epileptics, as some suppose, these are distinguished here (cf. Atti degli Apostoli 5:16). Personal actions are ascribed to demons. Christ addressed them as persons.
(3) Demoniacs were not unknown in more ancient times (see Levitico 20:27; 1 Samuele 16:14; 1Sa 28:7; 1 Re 22:21-11; Zaccaria 13:2). But they abounded in our Lord's day.
(4) It is not surprising that Satan should have been permitted, at the period of the advent of Messiah, to exercise this power and malignity against men. It was the time for the bruising of the heel of the woman's Seed—"the hour and power of darkness." It afforded an illustrious opportunity to the Saviour of men to display his superior power in crushing the serpent's head.
III. HIS GOSPEL WAS WITH MUCH ASSURANCE.
1. His miracles were demonstrative.
(1) They were wrought "among the people"—openly, in the light of day. There was no machinery of obscure theatres—no possibility of collusion. Many were healed—all that came, all that were brought; and the healed were to be seen everywhere among their friends.
(2) They were characteristic as the works of Messiah (see Isaia 35:5, Isaia 35:6). The miracles of Moses were chiefly plagues—works of judgment—suited to the terror of his dispensation. These of Christ were miracles of mercy (Osea 11:4). The goodness of his works was calculated to lead men to repentance Giovanni 10:32; Romani 2:4).
2. Hence the spreading of his fame.
(1) It spread throughout Syria—through the whole extent of that Roman province of which Palestine was a part. Hence the people from Decapolis, that portion of Syria north of Galilee, so called because it contained a group of ten cities, the metropolis and most ancient of which was Damascus.
(2) Great multitudes from all parts followed him. He deserves the attention of universal man. He deserves the universal attention of the faculties of every man.
(3) Those who came for healing had spiritual instruction. They were like the Syrian of earlier times (2 Re 5:15, 2 Re 5:17). They were like Saul, who, seeking the asses, found a kingdom. The kingdom they found was heavenly. Faith gains assurance in the preaching of the King.—J.A.M.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK
The leadings of the Spirit.
Whether we are to understand an impulse from Christ's own spirit, or a direction of the Divine indwelling Spirit, need not be disputed, because the two may be regarded as included, and the relation of the one to the other may be shown. The analogy of such verses as Ezechiele 8:3; Atti degli Apostoli 8:39; Apocalisse 1:10 suggests a state of ecstasy.
As Bushnell expresses it, "The fact is signified that the Spirit, coming here upon him in the full revelation of his call, raises such a ferment in his bosom of great thoughts and strangely contesting emotions, that he is hurried away to the wilderness, and the state of privacy before God, for relief and settlement."
I. THE IMPULSE AS A NATURAL SUGGESTION. If we place ourselves in our Lord's circumstances, we shall realize that we should have felt and acted precisely as our Lord did. Compare his action when the news came of John Baptist's death. At once he said to his disciples, "Come ye into a desert place, and rest awhile.
" There is no more natural feeling than the desire for seclusion when the heart is oppressed with great and anxious thoughts. Illustrate by the impulsive flight of Elijah into the desert of the Tih, by St. Paul's flight into the desert of Arabia, and by our Lord's seeking seclusion in Gethsemane. That there was a certain intensity in our Lord's impulse after his ordination is sufficiently explained by the unusual character of the descent of the Spirit on him. We need not hesitate to say that he was moved by his own desires.
II. THE IMPULSE AS A DIVINE OVERRULING. God may be in our impulses. He often is. He works through them. They are in the Divine sanctifying. This truth is even explicitly stated: "The Spirit witnesseth with our spirit." This, indeed, is the higher truth apprehended by the devout soul, who can see, and is always glad to see, the Divine in things, God working in what seems, to casual view, merely human work. The difficulty may be suggested, that we may easily be subject to delusions if we follow our impulses. In reply it may be said:
1. There is no danger, if we are open-souled, sincere, as Jesus was.
2. If we are trustfully seeking Divine guidance, as Jesus was.
3. If we are prepared to use the divinely provided tests, which will reveal any mere self-seeking in our impulses.—R.T.
The model temptation.
All the best writers hold that, whatever may have been the outward machinery of the temptation, the temptation was really a spiritual struggle. It was no model of our human temptations if it was not. Some have thought that the devil appeared as an old man, and talked with Jesus. But evidently all the things were suggestions to his mind; the first from the feeling of hunger and the sight of the stones; the others from his anxious thoughts about the modes of executing his mission.
The suggestions themselves were not evil; the sin could only have come by our Lord's yielding to them when he knew that they opposed the will of God. It would help us greatly if we could see that suggestion to the mind is not sin; our dealing with the suggestion makes the sin. It is, perhaps, better to conceive of the devil here as a personification of the enticing force—of evil suggestion. Suggestion is suggestion of the devil whensoever it is an enticement to wrong.
Olshausen says, "The temptation of Jesus took place in the depths of his inward life," in the sphere of his soul. By way of introduction, the probable scene of the temptation may be described, with a view to bringing out the effects of nature on sensitive, poetical minds. Illustrate the influence of the awful silence, and towering mountain-forms, of Sinai on Elijah. The Apostle John gives the great world-forces of temptation as "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride Of life" (1 Giovanni 2:16). Read our Lord's temptation in the light of St. John's terms.
I. THE LUST OF THE FLESH; OR, THE TEMPTATION THAT COMES THROUGH MAN'S APPETITES AND PASSIONS, The force of the first temptation lies in the natural cravings of hunger and thirst; these set men on intense endeavour to satisfy the craving.
With the consciousness of possessing miraculous power, our Lord was tempted to use his trust for the relief of his own needs. Illustrate by the hungry man who is tempted to steal. The claims of the flesh may urge us to do what we know is wrong.
II. LA LUSSURIA DI GLI OCCHI . Tentazione attraverso l'intelletto. La superiorità mentale cosciente può portare gli uomini a ingannare i loro compagni più deboli, e ad ingannare se stessi, persuadendosi che tale inganno è per il loro bene. C'è una tentazione speciale per gli intelligenti.
III. L' ORGOGLIO DELLA VITA . Orgoglio nel comando e nell'uso delle forze mondane, dello stato, dei privilegi di classe, dell'equipaggiamento, dei soldati, ecc. A Cristo la tentazione arrivò in questa forma: "Tu sei superiore; sai di essere superiore; afferma la tua superiorità e gli uomini si inchineranno fino a te."—RT
Tentazione attraverso condizioni fisiche.
In questa e in due successive omelie le diverse tentazioni devono essere trattate più precisamente. Le quattro omelie suggeriranno una serie di sermoni sulla "tentazione del Signore". La tentazione deve essere strettamente associata al battesimo. L'unica cosa necessaria per comprenderlo è la nostra apprensione del fatto che Gesù fosse diventato improvvisamente consapevole della fiducia dei poteri miracolosi; e doveva fissare il principio su cui solo avrebbe usato quei poteri.
La prima domanda da decidere era: li avrebbe usati per provvedere alle proprie necessità? Incontrando il senso più profondo della fame corporea, un'appassionata brama di cibo dopo un digiuno prolungato, è arrivata la consapevolezza di possedere un potere miracoloso. Sentì, come nel profondo della sua anima, un grido che diceva: "Perché soffri? Fai pane alle pietre. Puoi farlo". La forza della tentazione risiedeva da una parte nelle voglie dell'appetito corporeo, e dall'altra in questo nuovo senso di potere.
I. UMANA TENTAZIONE TRAMITE CORPOREE CRAVINGS . È la prima forma che ha preso la tentazione umana. Eva vide che il frutto dell'albero era gradevole e buono da mangiare. È la forma universale della tentazione, ma è la più bassa; appartiene all'uomo come animale. Sotto la tentazione dell'appetito corporeo, il ghiottone, l'ubriacone e il sensuale sono caduti in tutte le epoche.
La prima sfera di conflitto per l'essere spirituale dell'uomo è quella natura animale in cui è posto per sostenere i rapporti terreni. Quell'organizzazione corporea dovrebbe essere sua serva; si sforza sempre di essere il suo padrone e cerca di assicurarsi la sua fine con sottigliezze di bramosia e seduzione. Facilmente gli uomini sono stati portati a pensare che il corpo stesso sia malvagio. Ma il torto sta nella volontà squilibrata, che non riesce a trattenere e controllare l'appetito corporeo.
II. LA LEGGE DI TRIONFO OLTRE TENTAZIONE IN ARRIVO TRAMITE CORPOREE CRAVINGS . L'anima vale più del corpo. Un uomo non è un corpo; tutto ciò che è vero è che ha un corpo. La vita di un uomo non è la cosa materiale, mangiare e bere; che sostiene solo la natura animale. La vera vita di un uomo consiste nell'obbedienza alla volontà di Dio, come può venire a conoscerla; e se questo significa far morire di fame il corpo, il corpo deve essere affamato. —RT
Il vero cibo di un essere spirituale.
"L'uomo non vivrà di solo pane". Osservando la connessione originale delle parole citate, troviamo un'illustrazione del fatto che Dio potrebbe sostenere la vita con mezzi diversi dal cibo ordinario. "Una tale risposta deve avere una forza e un significato peculiari, poiché proviene dalle labbra di Cristo. Egli dice a Satana che l'obbedienza a Dio è meglio del pane; che se si deve rinunciare all'uno o all'altro non ci può essere dubbio, difficilmente può esserci una difficoltà, circa la decisione Semplicemente come uomini, tutti noi, i più poveri e i più grandi di tutti insieme, abbiamo bisogno della vita di obbedienza, ed è a buon mercato qualsiasi sacrificio della carne che ci guadagna" (Brooks).
I. L'UOMO COME A SPIRITUALE ESSERE . La più antica divisione dell'essere umano era in "corpo" e "anima"; ora è più precisamente diviso in "corpo", "vita animale" e "spirito"; sarx , psiche , pneuma. Corpo e vita abbiamo in comune con gli animali; e condividiamo con loro tutte le esperienze e le esigenze comuni.
Ma l'uomo è uno spirito , uno spirito immortale, che dimora e usa il corpo animato. Ci sono spiriti, e hanno corpi. È vero che siamo variamente influenzati dalle nostre relazioni corporee; ma proprio come lo Spirito eterno abita e controlla la sfera materiale, così l'uomo, lo spirito, dimora e controlla la sfera limitata del suo corpo. Allora le pretese dello spirito che è l' uomo devono sempre stare davanti alle pretese del corpo, di cui egli ha solo un'occupazione temporanea.
II. IL CIBO PER L'UOMO COME UN SPIRITUALE ESSERE . La complicazione sorge nel considerare questo argomento, perché il cibo per lo spirito deve venire principalmente attraverso le facoltà e le ricettività corporee. Ma c'è una netta distinzione tra il cibo che fornisce semplicemente la fame corporea, l'indulgenza che soddisfa l'appetito corporeo, e il cibo che nutre l'emozione e l'affetto, e coltiva la coscienza e la volontà.
Prendete l'uomo sensuale e l'uomo spirituale e mostrate come sono diversi in relazione al cibo quotidiano per il corpo e la mente. Il cibo di un essere spirituale è spirituale. Entra nel termine "obbedienza", che include sottomissioni, umiltà, affetti, comunione, servizio, lode, devozione, ecc. Lascia che un uomo nutra prima la sua anima, e l'anima nutrita regolerà in modo sicuro e saggio tutti i cibi del appetito corporeo.—RT
Tentazione attraverso ambizioni umane.
The second temptation was to the sin of presumption, to which sin the ambitious man, who sets an end before him, and means to gain it somehow, is especially exposed. From the tempter's point of view Jesus was ambitious to be the Messiah, so he tempted him to adopt the most showy and most speedy way of fulfilling his ambitions. "Make a show; the people love a show, and you will gain the end of your ambition at once; everybody will shout that you are Messiah.
" There is such a thing as a holy ambition, a proper love of admiration, an honourable desire for fame. But all its expressions and actions must be absolutely true and fair. No sincere man will deceive in order to succeed—will "do evil that good may come."
I. MEN'S AMBITIONS. Every man ought to have his ambition. He ought to mean something in life; he should set an aim before him. No man ever accomplishes anything unless he has ambition. Because the word has been misused is no reason why we should refuse to recognize its possible good use. Ambition may be an inspiring, ennobling force. Using the term in relation to Christ, we may recognize his ambition to save and bless the people of his day, and in the end all humanity. He would be the Messiah they needed.
II. MEN'S AMBITIONS PROVING TEMPTATIONS. This they do:
1. When they are simply self-seeking. Low-charactered ambitions are sure to lead men astray. Wealth, pleasure, fame, are sure to affect men's spirit and conduct; they always deteriorate men when they are made the life-aim.
2. When they set men on unworthy schemes. This was the kind of suggestion made by the tempter to our Lord. "Float down from the corner of the temple; men will think you have come down out of heaven, and accept your Messiahship at once." Ambitions provide perilous temptations when they suggest "schemes" and "dodges" and "deceptions."
III. MEN'S TEMPTATIONS THROUGH AMBITIONS MASTERED BY RELIGIOUS PRINCIPLE. This is the force of Christ's answer. A good man will only gain his ambitions on honest lines. A right-minded man feels that any attempt to deceive man is really that wicked thing, an attempt to get an advantage of God.—R.T.
The limits of angel-charge.
Observe the sentence omitted in the quotation. The psalmist wrote, "For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways." It may be that, from our points of view, the omission is not important, because we can see that it is involved even if it be not explicitly stated. The Divine care always assumes that its objects are in the sphere of duty. But it is significant that the tempter should omit what he evidently felt would spoil his persuasion.
I. ANGEL-CHARGE. There will always be two ways of dealing with the references to angels which are found in the Word of God.
1. The one way will be taken by the practical-minded, who can be content with the surface of things, and to whom facts are just facts. These will always people the unseen world with personal beings, who are conceived as constantly engaged in Divine ministries, and who have sometimes actually come into the field of human vision. "Are they not ministering spirits," etc.?
2. The other way will be taken by the mystical-minded, who cannot imprison their minds in forms, who are always seeking essences, spiritual realities, the things which gain varying embodiments for the apprehension of the human senses. To these, angels will seem to be personifications of the many Divine forces and influences that affect men's lives. God caring for us, God working for us, is for them the fact; angel-charge is for them the appearance. All join in recognizing that angel-charge is God with us as our Helper.
II. THE LIMITS UNDER WHICH ANGEL-CHARGE IS SET. "I being in the way, the Lord led me." It is always assumed that we are trying to go right and to do right. God helps those who mean to be obedient. The self-willed, those who, like Ephraim, are "joined to their idols," God lets alone.
The angels are removed if a man persistently resolves to "follow the devices and desires of his own heart." "If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land." There is, however, the gracious truth of the Divine overruling, even of man's infirmity and wilfulness, of which, in this connection, clue account needs to be taken.—R.T.
Temptation through the consciousness of power.
Bushnell observes that the report of the temptation can only have come from Christ himself. "And he simply meant, I have no doubt, in the three temptations recited, to report what appeared to him visionally speaking, or how they stood before his fevered brain. To believe that he was taken up into a mountain so exceedingly high that he could see all the kingdoms of the round world from the top, is fairly impossible.
All temptations are but seemings. The devils bait their hook never with truths, always with illusions." Before the mind of Christ a great procession of all the world-kingdoms seems to pass—kingdoms of nations, of learning, of pleasure, of wealth; and the evil suggestion seems to say," That power you are conscious of possessing includes and involves the command of all these world-forces. Use them, then.
Be the temporal Messiah that you are expected to be, and that you can be, and then, when your position is gained, you can use it for higher spiritual ends." It is the most subtle form that temptation takes for man. Get a position, anyhow. Get power, anyhow. And then you can use the position and the power for noble ends. It is always Satanic temptation; for if a man gets position and power unworthily, he is damaged and deteriorated in the getting, and so made unfit for the using when he has got. Christ would neither win his power nor use his power otherwise than as God's will should arrange.
I. WHAT THE LORD JESUS COULD DO. Seeley says, "The mental struggle is still caused by the question how to use the supernatural power. Nothing more natural than that it should occur to Christ that his power was expressly given to him for the purpose of establishing,, in defiance of all resistance, his everlasting kingdom.
" Clearly see that Christ's miraculous power placed all the world-forces at his command. He might have used them to found his Messianic kingdom. He would have used them if that had been God's will. It was not God's will, so for him to have used them would have been to serve the devil. This temptation comes to all who are born with genius, who are conscious of power in any direction—Is that genius to be self-ordered or divinely ordered?
II. WHAT THE LORD JESUS WOULD DO. Worshipping the Lord God is no mere act of homage; it is the life of obedience to the Divine will; the ordering of conduct by the Divine rule. The powers Christ had could only be used for God's purposes, in God's way.—R.T.
Jesus as John's successor.
The events in our Lord's life immediately following upon his temptation are exceedingly difficult to trace. There seems to have been a first ministry in Judaea, but the length of it is much disputed. Then a ministry in Galilee, which seems to have been begun before the news came of John's imprisonment. There is, therefore, a gap between verses 11 and 12 of this chapter. Matthew's general statements can be filled in from the more precise details of the other Gospels, and more especially of John's Gospel.
The point on which we fix attention is, that as soon as John's work ceased, Jesus took his work up and carried it on. God never lets his work fail. He always keeps his witnesses witnessing. The removal of one is always the placing of another. The truth is kept alive in the world by a constant succession of truth-bearers; and there never was a time when the Church or the truth was in danger because God had left himself without a witness.
I. A MAN'S SUCCESSOR CARRIES ON A MAN'S WORK. Work out three Scripture illustrations.
1. Joshua, as Moses'successor, carried on Moses' work. That work was the removal of Israel from Egypt, and its settlement in the promised land.
2. Elisha, as Elijah's successor, carried on Elijah's work. The confession of the lip at Carmel had to be made the confession of the life; and that meant quiet, persistent, family work throughout the land.
3. The Lord Jesus carried on the work of John the Baptist. Penitence is but a beginning, a preparation for righteousness. The Lord Jesus led penitent souls on to the joy of pardon and the power of holiness.
II. A MAN'S SUCCESSOR CARRIES ON THE WORK IN HIS OWN WAY. True succession never destroys individuality. Joshua differed from Moses, Elisha differed from Elijah, the Lord Jesus differed from John. It is often noticed that successors in statesmanship, in offices, and in pulpits, are usually strongly contrasted men.
Marked individuality is found to be quite consistent with continuity in aim and service. We best fit to our places, we are found even to fit in best with others, by being our own true selves. If we see clearly the relation of John to Jesus, let us be willing also to see clearly the relation of Jesus to John.—R.T.
The common message of John and Jesus.
Here is a fact of the records to which sufficient attention has not been given. Our Lord did not realize at once the individuality of his Messianic message. He began public labour by doing John's work and repeating's John's message. Both had this for their gospel, "Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Another remarkable fact needs to be noticed in this connection. When our Lord sent out his apostles on their trial-mission—a beginning of gospel-preaching for them, in which we expect them to deal with first principles—we find that he gave them John's message, "Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."
I. THE HONOUR THUS PUT ON JOHN. It is usual to represent John's work as superseded by Christ's. It is not so. His work was carried on by Christ. The "repentance" he demanded was shown by Christ to be the permanent demand which must be made of every man in all the ages. John never dies; his voice is never silenced; he reappears at Pentecost.
"Repent and be converted." John is no mere passing voice. He speaks to the world to-day. His message is. seen to be God's message for humanity when it gains repetition from the lips of the Lord Jesus. "Of those born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist."
II. THE HONOUR THUS PUT ON REPENTANCE. It is seen to stand permanently in the very forefront of the Divine requirements. It is the strait gate at the very head of the Christian way. When the way of salvation is represented as easy, as a weak yielding of the Divine love, it is well to remember that door of repentance which blocks the entrance.
So many now take up Christian profession on the persuasion of mere passing emotion, without any soul-humblings through repentance. John and the Lord Jesus gave the first place to repentance. No man can ever apprehend what Jesus is, as the Forgiver of sin, who has not learned of John what is repentance of sin. The weakness of so-called gospel-preaching nowadays is the absence, of Johannine demands of repentance, which both the Lord Jesus and his apostles made.—R.T.
Christ's call to service.
"Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men." From Giovanni 1:1. we learn that these men were previously called to discipleship. It was well that they should have a time of fellowship with Christ before they were further called to the service of Christ. Observe how the full idea of the Messiahship was gradually unfolded, stage by stage. Our Lord never hurried.
Ha dato un nobile esempio di "fare la prossima cosa"; e tutto il piano divino per lui gradualmente ma inesorabilmente si dispiegò. Questi uomini erano pescatori. Nostro Signore ha usato una figura che era loro abbastanza familiare e sarebbe molto suggestiva. Questi pensieri sarebbero sicuramente venuti loro in mente. Come i pesci devono essere raccolti, per essere abilmente raccolti e per essere raccolti con insistenza, così devono essere gli uomini. Cristo vuole che peschiamo uomini come, in questi lunghi anni, abbiamo pescato pesci in questo lago. Qui verranno descritte attente le barche, le reti e i metodi dei pescatori di Galilea.
I. GLI UOMINI HANNO PER ESSERE RACCOLTE . Moralmente, e in considerazione della loro indipendenza e caparbietà, gli uomini sono come i pesci che vagano liberi nell'acqua, andando da una parte o dall'altra a loro piacimento. Ma questa libertà è un pericolo morale. Ci sono nemici per gli uomini nella loro libertà, come ci sono per i pesci. Raccogli i pesci e liberali dai loro nemici. Raduna gli uomini alla fedeltà di Cristo, e così liberali dal male.
II. UOMINI HANNO DA ESSERE SAPIENTEMENTE RACCOLTA . Poche occupazioni implicano più abilità della pesca. Il pescatore deve giudicare il tempo, decidere la sua rete o lenza, adattare la sua esca e conoscere le abitudini delle creature. Così l'apostolo Paolo, come il grande pescatore evangelico, si sarebbe fatto «tutto a tutti». Illustrare dalle conversioni registrate nel Nuovo Testamento, sottolineando come diversi fossero i metodi usati in ciascun caso per effettuare la raccolta.
III. UOMINI HANNO DA ESSERE persistentemente RACCOLTA . Perché c'è una resistenza naturale che troppo spesso ha successo e deve essere affrontata ancora e ancora. Mostra dove fallisce la figura del pescatore. Coloro che pescano uomini li raccolgono per essere salvati in eterno. —RT
La missione di guarigione di Gesù.
L'eccitazione prodotta in Oriente dalle visite occasionali di un hakim, o medico, spiega efficacemente le scene descritte nella vita di nostro Signore, ma ci sembra molto strano e molto difficile da realizzare. Dean Stanley ha la seguente nota: "Fu dopo una passeggiata nel villaggio di Ehden, sotto la montagna dei cedri, che trovammo le scale e i corridoi del castello del capo maronita, lo sceicco Joseph, fiancheggiate da una folla di entusiasti ricorrenti, «malati presi da diverse malattie», i quali, udito che nel partito c'era un medico, si erano accalcati intorno a lui, «supplicandolo che li guarisse.
' Era una scena commovente; il nostro gentile dottore era angosciato nello scoprire quanti casi c'erano che, con gli opportuni dispositivi medici, avrebbero potuto essere curati." Alcuni hanno pensato che la malattia al tempo di nostro Signore assumesse forme insolite e gravi, ma probabilmente non abbiamo bisogno di fare altro che immaginare il condizione di una popolazione che viveva in condizioni antigieniche e senza alcun medico scientifico a disposizione.Tutte le forme di malattia erano allora pensate come irritazioni di spiriti maligni e maligni, e ogni guarigione era in realtà "esorcismo".
"Le guarigioni corporee di Nostro Signore sembrano essere state particolarmente caratteristiche del precedente ministero di Gesù; e dovrebbero essere sempre trattate come illustrative della sua opera, non come opera propria. La missione di guarigione di Gesù può essere posta in tre forme.
I. PER CALL ATTENZIONE . È un fatto singolare che quasi subito, all'inizio del suo ministero, Cristo fosse seguito da folle. Non avrebbe potuto raccoglierli come un Maestro morale. Nicodemo ci mostra ciò che ha catturato l'attenzione. "Nessun uomo può fare questi miracoli che tu fai a meno che Dio non sia con lui." Quindi le guarigioni crearono per Gesù una sfera, nella quale poteva svolgere un lavoro spirituale.
II. PER MOSTRARE IL SUO SPIRITO . Contrasta con quello dei farisei, che disprezzavano il popolo; e con il medico orientale, che pretende onorari rovinosi. Gesù cercava i poveri e gli ammalati e faceva del suo meglio per aiutarli inutilmente. Fu una rivelazione d'amore per l'uomo.
III. PER INDICARE LA SUA MISSIONE . Che era in relazione con la grande malattia del peccato dell'anima, ed è stata illustrata in queste guarigioni, liberazioni e redenzioni, che erano in relazione con le disabilità fisiche degli uomini. Ogni malattia è frutto del peccato. Cristo è venuto per affrontare il peccato, sia nella radice che nel ramo, nel fiore e nel frutto. —RT