The Grave of Bethany was thus in her eyes inseparably connected with the grave at Golgotha. But for the rolling away of the stone from a more august sepulchre, her brother must still have been slumbering in the embrace of death. "But now had Christ risen from the dead, and become the first-fruits of them that slept." The Almighty Reaper had risen Himself from the tomb, with the sharp sickle in His hand. In the person of His dearest earthly friend He presented an earnest-sheaf of the great Resurrection-reaping-time--when the mandate was to be carried to the four winds of heaven, "Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe;--Multitudes--multitudes in the Valley of Decision." Can we participate in the joy of the family of BETHANY? Have we, like them, followed Christ to His cross and His tomb, and listened to the angelic announcement, "He is not here, He is risen?" Have we seen in His death the secret of our life? Have we beheld Him as the Great Precursor emerging from Hades, and shewing to ransomed millions the purchased path of life--the luminous highway to glory? Let our hearts be as Bethany dwellings, to welcome in a dying risen Jesus. Let us not expel Him from our souls by our sins--crucifying the Lord afresh, and putting Him to an open shame. Let not God's restoring mercies be, as, alas! often they are to us, _unsanctified_;--receiving back our Lazarus from the brink of the tomb, but refusing, on the return of health and prosperity, to share in bearing our Lord's cross--to "go forth with Him without the camp--bearing His reproach." If He has delivered our souls from death, and our eyes from tears, be it ours to follow Him through good and through bad report. Not alone amid the hosannahs of His people, or amid the world's bright sunshine, but, if need be, to confront suffering, and trial, and death for His sake. Like the Bethany family, let us mourn His absence, and long for His return. It is but for "a little while" we "shall _not_ see Him"--"again a little while and we _shall_ see Him." Oh, blessed day! when the words of the old prophet will start once more into fulfilment, and a voice from Heaven will thus address a waiting Church--"Rejoice, O daughter of Zion, behold thy King cometh!" He cometh!--but it is now with no badges of humiliation--with no anticipations of sorrow and woe to mar that hour of glory. "His head shall be crowned with many crowns"--all His saints with Him to share His triumph and enter into His joy. May we be enabled to look forward to that blessed season when, arrayed in white robes, with golden crowns on our heads, and palms of victory in our hands, these shall be cast at His feet, and the feeble Hosannahs of time shall be lost and merged in the rapturous Hallelujahs of eternity! XXI. THE LAST VISIT.