When viewed under the inspiration of the Divine Spirit, which is the gift of God, the whole creation has the appearance of a sacrament. God is the Creator; he made the world and all things therein. He is personal, such a One who "layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him." He is eternal, which transcends all that we mean by time and space. Since he is creator, eternal and personal, eternally he creates, and communicates himself, for self-communication is the essence of the personal life. This eternal Word, which is God himself in self-expression, originated all things. The visible universe is the actualization of that divine word. In the fullness of time that Word was uttered in a single human life, Jesus Christ, our Lord. It made possible to man a fuller comprehension of the Eternal god than would otherwise have been possible. This Word and the work of God it originates have neither beginning nor end. God the Eternal Father created the anticipation of Christ's advent in the minds of the Hebrew prophets, and foreshadowed it in the ordinances given to Israel. Since he came in the flesh, he has guided the course of history, and through faith, and in spite of apostasy made possible the Restoration movement.

Is Prophetic

This is not all. The communication of God to his creation goes ever forward and is cumulative. All that has gone before constitutes a prophecy of what is yet to be, and is itself the shape of things to come. History itself is prophecy, and such utterance of God in the course of time helps to fashion and shape those things which are to come. This principle will be apparent as we proceed with our analysis of the nature of prophecy, for the revelation of God is still incomplete. We look for a community to emerge from history under God which shall be the "body of Christ"-a company great and glorious, dominated by the "Word of God"-Jesus Christ.

Has a Spiritual Tradition

We are the inheritors of a most wonderful spiritual tradition-an inheritance that not only gives meaning to the past, but offers guidance for the future. We must examine briefly this tradition and bear in mind while we do so, that it does not stand alone; it is environed in a living process which encompasses the deeds of all men of all time and the behavior of every element in existence.

What is the faith of the church? What was "once delivered unto the saints"? Let us bear in mind that it is a "faith," not a system of morals, nor a code of ethics, nor a panacea for the ills of the world. This faith is an assumption of the truth, and an enlightenment of life, based upon a revelation of that truth. It is not a philosophy of existence, but an insight into the life of God. It is not illumined by reason or logic, but it corrects, sanctifies and hallows these wholly human activities. It is not a rigid system of thought, or a moral equation like a scientific formula. It is a clue to the meaning of the whole. It is not blind trust in an unimaginable mystery. It is an inward light which sheds its radiance on the pathway before us. It is not an uprush from the dark unfathomed caverns of the human mind, nor the rationalization of a "mysterium tremendum" which some say lies behind the visible world. It is a gift reaching downward from the "Father of Lights." "The Faith" (and we use the capital "F") is not a key idea leading to enlightened thought. It is something enkindled in man, and is the urge to righteous action. Santayana has described faith as an "invincible surmise," and the Book of Mormon informs us that it is "wrought" in the soul by the Spirit of God.

Is an Upreach to God

The faith of the church is best understood as men direct their minds toward God. When we think only of each other, then that faith wavers and our sight grows dim, and the sense of direction uncertain. The gospel does not originate in the minds of men, nor in their needs. It originates in the nature of God. It is a disclosure of the truth. On this basis alone it urges its claim to meet human need. There exists no expert wise enough or brave enough to prescribe a remedy for them. In the midst of Paradise, we are told, there is a tree, the leaves of which are "for the healing of the nations." This delightful parable represents the fact that the truth alone will make men free. Pilate asked the question, "What shall I do with Jesus, which is called Christ?" This question is always asked by those whose minds are directed only outwards and never upwards. For the Christian faith it is an irrelevant question. It is not "What shall I do with Jesus, which is called the Christ?" but "What will Christ do with me?" Our faith is based on a true disclosure of the nature of God in Christ. Whatever it bestows on life or thought, ethics or morals, politics or economics springs from the fact that it is true. The primary question is not even "Will it work?" The primary question is "Is it true?" It claims to be the Spirit of the Whole revealed to those whom God wills. It does not abolish or set aside what men know about matter, life, and mind, but transforms such knowledge in its own light.

Those to whom Jesus came had some knowledge of God and of his law. This knowledge Jesus extended and completed. He taught no pharisaical code, and even his teaching was not so far as we know presented in systematic form, but he did claim to be the Light and Life of the world. In him could all life be illumined and all human activity reoriented. No system of reasoning could have revealed him to be this. The fundamental truths stemming from the gospel are apprehended only as a result of a new birth of man's entire being brought about by the action of God within the soul. Faith always outruns reason. Faith is vindicated in life, and life is always in advance of thought. This does not mean that faith is irrational. It means, simply, that faith is of the whole man, an illumination which is itself a divine gift, and in the light of which man is given direction and rational grounds for his reason. There is no legitimate field of human life or thought into which the faithful Christian may not safely and freely and intelligently go, and therein find confirmation of his faith.

What does this amount to? We are to be persuaded by the Spirit of the truth that "God is in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself." The persuasion is first upward toward God. Second, and only second, it is outward toward men. As the disclosure of God in Christ draws men upward, so will it bring them together. Any attempt to begin at the other end, with the mistakes and ills of the world, calling on Divinity simply to heal these, will end in failure, or at best, in but partial success. A complete healing of the nations begins in a new man and ends in a new heaven and a new earth, and the new man is born from above as he cooperates freely and willingly with God.

Justifies Itself

Faith must justify itself. It does this in the lives of those who trust in God. Such justification of faith in life issues in a complete and comprehensive soul-satisfying system of thought which is unique. The acceptance in faith of this gospel-namely, that God was in Christ-accords with procedures in the fields of art and science. The basic assumptions of art seem to be the unity of life and the universality of beauty, and the sheer inevitability of artistic form. Similarly, the scientist accepts the universal reign of law as a dogma even before he knows what that law is in its entirety. This is illustrated in the fact that Albert Einstein unsuccessfully searched for a "unified field theory" which would completely explain the structure and nature of matter. This does not prevent others from holding the conviction that there was and is such a theory. Now (1958) comes the news that Professor Eisenberg feels that he may have succeeded, although years of further research will be necessary to determine if he has done so or not. So the search goes on, and is conditioned and sustained in faith. Similarly, the faith of the church is expressed in the ever growing quest for truth, and the deepening convictions of her people as these are sustained by worship-worship based on the belief that God is, and is a "rewarder of those who diligently seek him." So without faith it is impossible to please him. In describing this approach to reality-the gospel approach-we are describing a procedure which is productive of truth and beauty everywhere. The gospel deals with human relationships, but only in a secondary sense. Primarily, the gospel is a declaration of the nature and mind of God, and is concerned first to secure the proper relationship of man to his Maker. Human relationships not founded on this primary consideration are based on shifting sands and thus are insecure. The revelation of God in Christ comes first-and out of this issues a covenanted relation between man and God. Charity is a fruitage of this revelation, and can grow in man from no other source. This is another way of stating the great commandment, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, might, mind and strength, and thy neighbor as thyself."

So the Word, displayed everywhere in nature, was made flesh, so that men might know how rightly to conceive God. Faith in God, rightly conceived, will issue eventually in a transformed society, and conviction that such a society will inevitably appear sustains the faithful in their sacrificial endeavors. They not only thus anticipate history but actually participate in framing it. But faith in the God of our Lord Jesus Christ is ever and always the ground of such endeavor. We may well inquire, now, as to the nature of Christ's revelation of God.

Is a Living Process

Jesus came to those who had already gained a unique conception of the Divine. The Jews of his day regarded the Old Testament and their own history much as we regard the history of our own nation. We ourselves are the latest phase of that history; they were of theirs. They did not regard their background as we might think of the history of the Chinese, from a critical outside point of view. The Jews of Jesus' day had with them a conviction of the nature of God based on a sympathetic view of the Old Testament and their own history to its latest phase. This Jesus took for granted and indeed was himself schooled in this point of view, a point of view which reflected the fact that the Old Testament was a living thing, and that in some sense it was incomplete since a revival of the ancient prophetic fire was hoped for and looked for. There are several aspects of this living faith which Jesus enlarged and completed which we must note.

Comprehends God as One

First, God is One, and he is holy and utterly righteous. This conviction was a product of history interpreted by the prophets. In earlier times, it seems, Yahweh was the God of Israel, much as Chemosh was the God of Moab. Even Joshua admonishes his people to put away "the gods," whom he appears to take for granted. While Israel's God is a jealous God, according to the Decalogue, and others are not to be served or seriously regarded, it is not until after the Exile that the conviction is secured that there is no other God in existence. The people went into Babylon uncertain on this point. Only those who believed the prophets had the stamina and stability to return and rebuild Jerusalem. So the captivity bore fruit, religiously, in that it left to Israel the conviction, "I am the Lord, . . . there is no God beside me." This one God was righteous. In all the earth he judged and "did right." He was consistent and utterly true to himself, and thus holy. Rudolf Otto has, in recent years, made it clear that to primitive peoples, especially, there is a spirit of dreadful mystery in the universe and this occasions their awe and worship. The Hebrew people came gradually to associate the spirit with the majesty of the "law of the Lord," which converts "the soul." So, for them, conscience was indeed a "stern daughter of the voice of God," and his unity and absolute purpose was holy and righteous.

God is Personal

Second, God is personal and living. There are some lofty ideas about ultimate reality in the philosophy of Plato and his pupil, Aristotle. To them God is remote and seemingly impervious to human fortune. He is high and exalted and he inhabits eternity, but he is primarily an object of intellectual contemplation. For the philosophers, God is not a being to be loved and obeyed, one who wants and desires the obedience of men. In the Far East, the doctrine of Nirvana prevailed and God was thought of in terms of a presence pervading all, like a vast sea, with no one above and beyond controlling it. But to Israel, God was a living God, who created all things and who created man, his creature, and who, furthermore, made man in his own image and after his own likeness. Israel did not reach this conclusion either by philosophy or by contemplation. It was a conviction born in them by the prophets who interpreted and sometimes guided their history. It originated in a divine utterance-"Thus saith the Lord."

Those who wrote the Old Testament were concerned with the doings of men only incidentally. Primarily, they were concerned about the doings of God, what he purposed and what he wanted. In a sense the Old Testament is a commentary on the history, the judgments, and the misfortunes of God, who in Isaiah's tremendous phrase was "made . . .to serve with thy sins," and who was eventually to "bear the sin of many." When the nation became involved in the struggles between great empires, and their small tribal concerns seemed almost incidental, then it was the prophecy developed into apocalypse and vast movements were seen on the background of long periods of time. This was a justification and an extension of the unity and power of God, who, despite the tremendous issues involved, still, in the end, asserted his complete control of the historical process. Even if these contending powers all but destroyed Israel, always there would remain an indestructible "remnant."

Accepts God as Creator

Third, God is Creator, he is holy, but he is also like a Father. This idea came later in Israel's history, and never quite appears to be dominant. Moses asked for the preservation of Israel so that God could vindicate himself, not because he might love them. But gradually it came to be a certainty that along with his other attributes, while perhaps subordinate to them, God loved Israel.

When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt. As they called them, so they went from them; they sacrificed unto Baalim, and burned incense to graven images. I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms; but they knew not that I healed them. I drew them with the cords of a man, with bands of love; and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them. -Hosea 11: 1-4.

The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy. He will not always chide; neither will he keep his anger for ever. He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust. -Psalm 103: 8-14.

Affirms God is King

Fourth, God is King as well as Judge. Thus comes the idea of the kingdom. He had called Abraham out of Ur and given to him a land of promise. Israel was "chosen." They were a special people. Under David and Solomon the kingdom had been glorious. Now, in Jesus' day, Israel was in bondage to Rome. The Jews looked for deliverance, it is true, but much more than deliverance. They looked for God's specially anointed One to restore to them the ancient glories of the kingdom of David. In this they were almost certainly completely self-centered. The highest reaches of prophetic insight indicated that their choosing was based on God's indiscriminate and impartial love for all men, and that Israel was chosen to be used by God, not to be served but to serve. It was left to Jesus to make this crystal clear, the common man never grasped it. Indeed, even after the death and resurrection of our Lord, his apostles asked if this now was the time he would restore the kingdom to Israel. So the common man of Jesus' day was "slow of heart" to believe all that the prophets had spoken. While he was convinced that the Israelites were called out and were a "chosen people," the common man never grasped fully the purpose of their calling. They did not realize wholly the nature of that God who so wonderfully had blessed them, and who now was ready to speak "unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds."

So when Jesus came, he took for granted these elements in the faith of the Jews. God was Creator, holy and righteous, One who loved his children, and who had called them in a special way to a life of national uniqueness. On these presuppositions Christ imposed his life and his teaching-what he said, and what he did. He did not set aside nor abrogate the law. That law was divine. He himself had given it. He proposed to interpret and complete the purpose of the law by bequeathing to men a new spirit. In his day men were cruel. If a man wronged another, the spirit of revenge, which looked backward to the wrong act, demanded retribution and vindication. Unchecked, the lust for revenge will take two eyes for one. The Mosaic Law sought to set limits to this vengeful spirit which evil always incurs, until the people could bear a higher law which looked to the future, not the past. The object of the law is to prevent and abolish crime, not to punish it. If the law punishes crime, it is only to prevent others from committing crime. If a law were perfectly obeyed, it would be unnecessary. So the Mosaic Law began what Christ completed; it set limits to the natural rapacity of those to whom injury had been done. It prepared them for that fuller disclosure that earlier they could not have endured. Jesus taught there should be no retaliation of any kind, whatever the provocation.

Is Aligned with Divine Law

The people paid tithes to their religious leaders. The leaders themselves paid a tenth of their property. That was the rule. What they did with the other nine tenths was their business. Man can observe a rule and forget it. But no one will ever forget the widow's mite. For the purpose of the tithe is to help men recognize that all their property belongs to God, and not one cent can be exempted from God's claim to use it as He thinks fit. "Thou shalt not covet thine own property" is not a command given in isolation to Martin Harris to meet an emergency. It is an expression of the spirit with which Jesus would complete and fulfill the law. Men were not to escape from the spirit of the law in the observance of the letter. Such righteousness was of the Pharisees and prevented men entering the kingdom. The spirit which found expression in Jesus is much more demanding and exacting, and much easier to observe than the letter of the law, or than any formal code that could be devised. What about the rule of forgiveness? Is it to be three times or seven that men were to forgive those who injured them? According to Jesus, mathematics was introduced into the equation simply to produce a forgiving disposition. Even if it is conceivable that one man could injure another and be forgiven four hundred and ninety times, the next time the same situation arose would see the injured party so in the habit of forgiving that he would forgive without even stopping to count. The spirit is always more exacting than the letter. So Jesus took the law and the prophets for granted and proceeded to fulfill and extend their work.

Asserts the Supremacy of God

This teaching is based, of course, on Christ's understanding of his Father's nature. To him that nature is absolutely ultimate and supreme. This was never stated, so far as we know, in any logical or philosophical sense. Jesus took it for granted and acted on its truth. He lived as if God were tremendously interested in all that he and others did, for "I do always those things that please him," he said. It seemed he was more concerned over a widow's tears than he was over the Roman Empire. God's supremacy is taken for granted, but it is in his Lordship over the little things that Jesus loves to dwell-the fledgling in the nest, the flower of the grass, the hairs on a head. It was to the little children he turned when he wanted to give the supreme illustration of the requirements of entrance into the kingdom of God. His Father's care for these little ones was to Jesus a supreme fact, and doom was solemnly pronounced on those who "offended" them or "prevented" them from coming to God.

Jesus' Concept of God

Jesus took for granted and taught the supremacy of God, and that was evidenced in his concern over the smallest details of man's daily life. Napoleon was a supreme military genius. His victories were won on two grounds. First, he was master of strategy and knew the broad sweep and general direction his tactics should follow. Second, he was a master of logistics, which means he knew what every man had in his knapsack, and how much ammunition was allotted to every cannon. He was a colossal master of detail. Jesus trusted implicitly, likewise, in the fact that the broad concerns and plots of the drama of history were in his Father's hands, but second, and equally, every detail and thought of every creature's life was under the providence of God. Every drop of rain and every ray of sunshine reflected the utter impartiality of the divine love and expressed his Father's never failing determination to bless mankind.

The Moral Law

Another aspect of Jesus' teaching is this. The world and all in it, visible and invisible, were indissolubly united with the moral law within man. To him all things were spiritual. The prophets had seen this before, and Psalm 19 expresses the same conviction. But never before Jesus came had it been given such detailed emphasis with such startling effect. The parables use a vast range of subjects and events, all of them apparently very ordinary, to teach the reality of the idea that there is no gap between spiritual and temporal. When viewed as they should be, all things are made to testify of the kingdom of God. This is true of natural accidents or the "accidents" of birth. Those on whom the tower in Siloam fell were no more wicked nor righteous than others, and the man born blind bore neither his own sin nor the sin of his parents. It is easy for self-centered men to see the judgments of God in natural accidents or disasters that happen to others, but it is also very wicked, and unless repentance comes to those who view these natural phenomena that way, destruction likewise awaits them. For even if a man be born blind or a baby enter the world deformed, yet even these things offer an opportunity to develop the glory of God! The danger to the disciples, in this respect, is on a different basis than the others, who were (to them) sinners. Jesus was concerned that each one see the purpose of God for him, and in every detail of life he would have his followers work out his purpose, leaving the larger matters, over which they had not control, in the divine hands. If one disciple cared to linger until the Lord return, and another were curious, then came the question, "What is that to thee? Follow thou me." Undoubtedly we miss the mark now when we fail to "look unto him in every thought, and doubt not, nor fear." All falls within the divine purpose, and good and evil both are encompassed in it, as are both the temporal and the spiritual orders of existence.

Recognizes God's Universal Love

To Jesus, then, God was supreme and in him all things were to be gathered in one. But perhaps the most amazing thing of all was his emphasis on the universal love of God. To him this was utterly without exception-it was, perhaps, indiscriminate. A woman's faith broke down the narrow barriers ordaining that the food on the banquet table should not be given to dogs, while a Roman soldier's son had the selfsame consideration and blessing as the daughter of Jairus. To Jesus, in every nation "he that feareth God and worketh righteousness, is accepted of him." The Prophet Amos saw that God cared for the Ethiopians and had brought "the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir." To Amos, God was King of the whole earth, and nations and empires were but as pebbles in his hand. If there could be only one God, there could be only one will to which all nations were subjected. Jesus, however, goes an infinite distance beyond this. For him, God loves all alike, and as Paul says, in Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither bond nor free, neither Greek nor barbarian. Every distinction between men based on religion, wealth, or culture is, in Christ, utterly abandoned; and in him, even sex is abolished. God loves all men and it seems his love is unquenchable. Men may defy him, ignore him, wound and crucify him, yet nothing they can do can alter, one iota, God's never failing love and concern. John saw this and stated that "God is love." So that he does not love men because men are loveable or beautiful or wicked or righteous, but he loves them because he is love. That, to our blessed Lord, is the ultimate fact, and he himself was the "Son of Fact."

Demands Obedience through Love

The doctrine of the love of God cannot be rightly understood apart from the divine sovereignty. God is King as well as Father, and Jesus drives this home with terrible words:

And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him. -Luke 12: 4, 5.

In the Old Testament, reference is made to the "fear of the Lord." This surely means the reverence which is due to a sovereign Lord in whose presence we are unworthy and small and weak. Whatever man may do to us, of injury or bodily harm, is to be deprecated in the fear of God. Men ought to obey God rather than other men. For the love of God is sovereign, demanding that we be raised to his own level; and he spares himself or us no pains until this is fully accomplished. God is against all self-centeredness in man since this prevents the accomplishment of his purpose, and his judgments against those who are self-centered seem very terrible. Just prior to his death, Jesus put this principle in the following terms: "The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner. Whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." The King desires the love of his subjects, but this must be freely given or else it is not love at all. Because the King is love, then, he gives us the awful responsibility of freedom. That means we are free, if so minded, to reject and repel him, to go our own way into perdition. This is because it is our choosing, not his. Freedom, under God, is a divine gift, but it brings terrible responsibility, such responsibility as were intolerable save for one fact. That fact is that those who desire to be obedient and worship the Father in spirit and in truth are promised his Spirit. This gift of the spirit was promised by Jesus just prior to his departure, and was to be "sent" to the disciples after he had been received up into heaven. Man was not to be left alone to offer his own unworthy response to the wonderful love offered. God was to come by his Spirit to dwell in the hearts of the faithful, enlightening the mind, guiding the worship, and fashioning their lives according to the divine will.

This new effusion of the Spirit, while distinct from the Father and the Son, was God working within men to fashion his kingdom. Love calls to men in the ministry of Christ interpreted by the Spirit. Men answer in love to that call, only to discover that the love with which they respond is God himself working within them.

Is Based on the Revelation in Jesus

When we turn to what Jesus did to reveal God, we are even more astounded. Doubtless early disciples wrote down at various times the sayings of our Lord. At least it seems to be the consensus of Bible scholars that both Matthew and Luke depended somewhat on these early fragments or sources of Jesus' sayings. But the greatest of all missionaries, Paul, hardly mentions the Sermon on the Mount. He is concerned to proclaim the death and resurrection of Christ. He preached Christ and "him crucified" rather than expounding the sayings of a supreme teacher of morality. It is in what Christ did that his power over the lives of men consists. What he did gives life to what he said.

We must be very careful, here, to notice that the gospel affirms that "the Word was made flesh." This means that the earthly life of Jesus is not a mere historical episode. It means that the early life of Jesus is a disclosure, a momentary disclosure, of the Eternal God. God, the Eternal and Almighty, is like Jesus Christ. His character is the character of Christ, so that what Jesus said to Philip is the absolute truth: "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." In Jesus we see what God does when confronted by situations confronting us. And what does he do?

First, he rejects all temptations to establish his kingdom by earthly methods. That is the meaning of the three temptations. These must have been related by Jesus himself since he was alone at the time.

Men will follow those who will give them bread. Isaiah had suggested the idea of a Messianic banquet. But the stones were not made bread even to satisfy Jesus' own hunger.

Earthly governments use force to ensure a degree of social solidarity, and the idea of the "throne of David" suggested to the Jews that compulsion might legitimately be used in establishing the divine kingdom. But Jesus put this thought behind him also, even though there were thousands who would have spent their lives and fortunes to overthrow Rome.

Men will cleave to mystery. Daniel had seen the Son of man coming miraculously in the "clouds of heaven." A miracle or two, wrought by Jesus in his own behalf, would have celestialized his being in the minds of men and they would have followed him. But this, too, is a subtle form of compulsion, unworthy of him. And so Jesus resisted the tempter. But the temptations did not cease. The disciples felt at times that men should be compelled to accept him or be destroyed. The Sons of Thunder wished to call down fire from heaven and had to be rebuked. And, even before the final ordeal, Jesus was conscious of legions of angels who doubtless would have saved him. But it was at the Last Supper that the supreme height of divine insight was expressed. Christ protected Judas while Judas betrayed him. The traitor was in the hands of the betrayed, for Jesus knew what Judas would do. This explains the cryptic messages through which the upper room was prepared. It seems that even at the last Jesus made a desperate appeal, an appeal of love, by specially selecting Judas, for "when he had dipped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot." Instead of softening his heart, Judas hardened it, and because Jesus would have no unwilling disciples he said to Judas, "That thou doest, do quickly."

Again let it be emphasized that we are witnessing, here, the dealings of the eternal God with the souls of men. We are not watching the dealing of one man with another. God appeals to men in the name of his love. But he never overrides their freedom. If a son chooses to turn traitor-so let it be. What an awful and impartial thing is the divine love when viewed from this angle of vision!

Brings Forth Miracles

We turn now to the miracles of Jesus, for these also explicate to a degree the nature of God. Jesus seems to shy away from the public interest his miracles arouse. No doubt, loving people as he did and seeing their great need, he must use his power to meet that need. When, however, public interest had arisen to the point where all men sought him, he proposed to go into the next town "that," he said, "I may preach there also; for therefore came I forth." A leper came to be healed, and Jesus responded to the appeal but sternly forbade him to speak of the matter. But the leper began to "blaze abroad the matter" and so prevented Jesus from openly entering the city. It was evidently contrary to his purpose for men to seek him for bodily healing alone, and when they did, he avoided them. His main purpose was the preaching of the kingdom, and to him that was primary. Physical blessing is incidental to this purpose, for the miracles of Jesus assert the supremacy of the Spirit over the flesh. That supremacy is in part conditioned in the coming of the kingdom. He broke no natural law-for natural law is a perfectly natural result of a natural cause. The miracles of Jesus were simply the supernatural results of what appears to us to be a supernatural cause. There were no unnatural. Further, it must be remembered that Christ promised his disciples that they could use these same laws to do "greater works." The physical world can be controlled according to the divine will, and when men have that will, the will to build up the kingdom, they have control also over the temporal world to remedy what sin has done.

God never "breaks" a law of nature to work a miracle. What appears to us as a miracle is not outside of or inconsistent with the divine nature. God is always utterly self-consistent. His holiness is constituted in part by this never-deviating self-consistency. There is no "natural law" over against him who is the Lawgiver, and no limitation whatever on the Almighty. When God acts, as always he does, his action never violates either his nature or the nature with which he endows every created being. When miracles seem to violate what we know of the laws of nature, they do not actually do so. They appear sometimes to be "against" what we know about nature. The apparent inconsistency is not caused by divine action but by our limited understanding.

Always Jesus subordinated his miraculous power to the requirements of love. His miracles were God's protest against sin. In fact this appears the greatest miracle of all, that he loved men, for in him absolute power was co-joined with ultimate goodness. John the Baptist had witnessed the sealing of Christ's commission at the water's edge. Yet his faith wavered and he was confused when in prison. "Art thou he that should come? or look we for another?" he asked. So far as John could see, nothing was happening to change the course of history. The answer Jesus sent back was amazing. It amounted to a reiteration of what he was doing and a pronouncement of blessing upon all those who would take no offense at him. This, then, is the fundamental principle of the kingdom-power is subordinate to love. Power in any form, whether in the form of wealth, of health, of special abilities and gifts and talents, is, in the kingdom, made to serve the requirements of love.

Is Sealed in the Crucifixion and Resurrection

We come now to those three supreme acts by which Jesus made God known. They are the crucifixion, the resurrection, and the ascension. Just before he took his last journey, he engaged in an act of glorious communion, the transfiguration, in which he permitted Peter, James, and John to participate. Afterwards, he set his face steadfastly to go to Jerusalem, telling his followers that he would suffer, be killed, and rise again. He cleansed the temple in a blaze of moral indignation, for the people whom God loved had a right to an undefiled house of prayer. He instituted the Last Supper and washed the disciples' feet, and here we see the Son of God among men as a servant. In the Eucharist he "took the bread, and blessed it, and gave to them and said, Take, eat; this is my body." The same night he was betrayed. But it must be emphasized that what Judas did was with the sanction of the Lord, and so the Lord's death was voluntary. No one took his life by stealth. He himself chose the time and place and determined the conditions under which he would lay down his life, and take it again.

The Jews had been taught the principle of sacrifice through their ordinances. Now the reality which the ordinances foreshadowed was about to be enacted. His death was a sacrificial offering, not an execution. He was the victim; there would be no more animal substitutes. What did Jesus accomplish by the cross? Surely a complete answer is not possible, but a few salient facts stand out. Since Calvary no one can ever feel that his sin is a matter of little moment to God. And let all remember that it was not the wicked sinners that did him to death. The outcasts of society had no issue with him. It was the "respectable" sinners who rejected and scourged and finally crucified him. Pilate had his political position to consider; the religious leaders must maintain their influence over the people; the financial interests must secure their profits. So it is now. What we see in Calvary happens every day; the innocent are destroyed by political blindness, respectable pride, and financial greed. For Calvary is a "Moment Eternal," to use a phrase of Robert Browning, when the universe stands still, as it were, to see in time what time does in Eternity. God suffers, is rejected, and killed; but still his forgiveness is free. There are no prior conditions which we must fulfill predisposing him to forgive. But we must see sin for what it is, and righteousness must be disclosed also for what it is. This we realize in Calvary, for God destroys sin by bearing it on the cross himself, and showing it forth on the background of his love. This displays an almighty power that works so wondrously. For the cross has always had the power to destroy sin in the hearts of men and "deliver them who, through the fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage."

But the cross and the death of Christ, if revealing the depth of the divine love and the nature of sin, do not entirely show forth the divine power. "We trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel," said the disappointed disciples after his death. It was the resurrection that vindicated the love of God in power. It justified the lengths to which Christ went in suffering to redeem mankind. Imagine what the gospel would be without the resurrection! It would be no gospel at all, but a poignant memory of a gentle spirit who fell short, as we all do. But now is Christ risen! And all that went before illumined and made effective to accomplish that complete revelation of God in Christ. "All power is given unto me," he asserted, "in heaven and earth."

So at the last, the earthly ministry of Jesus, in which for our sakes God sustained a truly human existence, ended with his ascension. This enacted drama took him from human sight and set him free to be found everywhere in the hearts and minds of those who love him and are called to be saints. The man Jesus inherited a great and noble religious tradition. He accepted, corrected, and enlarged it, and in his own life perfected and sanctified it, demonstrating that he was Jesus the Christ. All revelation centers in him who is the Light and Life of the world and the true focus of illumination for all men of all ages, past, present, and future.

The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy, and the Spirit is the faith of the church. II