Adonijah: A Tale of the Jewish Dispersion.Strickland, Jane Margaret
History
Adonijah: A Tale of the Jewish Dispersion.
Strickland, Jane Margaret
Jerusalem -- History -- Fiction; Jerusalem -- History -- Siege, 70 A.D. -- Fiction; Jews -- Fiction
In her face the Hebrew still traced the love that had formerly gilded
his chains, and made his bondage sweet. All indeed that a pious
Christian could feel for one of differing faith, Lucia felt for
Adonijah. He had first won her from idolatry and darkness to worship
Jehovah, and, though no human passion could beguile her heart from Him,
its tender affections were still placed upon the captive Jew. For his
conversion she prayed unceasingly, and every conversation she held with
him had the same noble object in view.
A deep sense of his own unworthiness, a sensibility to sin never
experienced before, was felt by the half-convinced Pharisee. He reviewed
his past life, and internally owned that he had come short of that
perfection demanded by a holy God.
He was ready to acknowledge Jesus as a prophet, as “a teacher sent from
God,” for had not his prophetic words respecting Jerusalem been
fulfilled in his own day? This was much for a Jew to acknowledge, but it
is and has been acknowledged by many who have died like their
forefathers, strangers to the salvation wrought by Christ.
“Search the Scriptures,” said our Lord to the Jews of His day, “for in
them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify of
me.” “Search thou the Scriptures, who art an heir of the promises made
to Abraham,” said Linus to the doubting Hebrew, “and thou wilt see that
we have not followed ‘cunningly devised fables.’”
Adonijah examined those sacred records daily and perseveringly, praying
the Lord Jehovah to enlighten his mind respecting Him whom the
Christians affirmed to be the Messiah of the Jews. He found every type
and shadow complete, every prophecy fulfilled in that wondrous Person
whom the Jews had rejected and slain. His heart was softened, nay, it
was pierced through with a view of his sins and his sinless Saviour’s
sufferings.
At first the Divinity of Jesus Christ was to him, as to the Jews of this
day, “a stumbling-block and rock of offence;” but the New Testament,
which declares Him “to be the Son of God with power,” only confirms the
previous testimony borne by the Old. The evidence of both is in perfect
and beautiful harmony with each other. Adonijah compared them together,
and found the chain complete, till like Thomas he said of Jesus, “My
Lord and my God.”
The life and doctrines of Jesus alone would declare his Divinity, even
if it had not been confirmed by miracles or foreshown by prophecy. Human
nature fallen and degenerate could never have produced fruits like
these. Compare his brightest saints with the Son of God, and they only
shine with beams reflected from his surpassing glory.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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