If in the human form God thus visited his people, he would naturally
show himself Lord over their circumstances. He will not lord it over
their minds, for such lordship is to him abhorrent: they themselves must
see and rejoice in acknowledging the lordship which makes them free.
There was no grand display, only the simple doing of what at the time
was needful. Some say it is a higher thing to believe of him that he
took things just as they were, and led the revealing life without the
aid of wonders. On any theory this is just what he did as far as his own
life was concerned. But he had no ambition to show himself the best of
men. He comes to reveal the Father. He will work even wonders to that
end, for the sake of those who could not believe as he did and had to be
taught it. No miracle was needful for himself: he saw the root of the
matter--the care of God. But he revealed this root in a few rare and
hastened flowers to the eyes that could not see to the root. There is
perfect submission to lower law for himself, but revelation of the
Father to them by the introduction of higher laws operating in the upper
regions bordering upon ours, not separated from ours by any impassable
gulf--rather connected by gently ascending stairs, many of whose
gradations he could blend in one descent. He revealed the Father as
being _under_ no law, but as law itself, and the cause of the laws we
know--the cause of all harmony because himself _the_ harmony. Men had
to be delivered not only from the fear of suffering and death, but from
the fear, which is a kind of worship, of nature. Nature herself must be
shown subject to the Father and to him whom the Father had sent. Men
must believe in the great works of the Father through the little works
of the Son: all that he showed was little to what God was doing. They
had to be helped to see that it was God who did such things as often as
they were done. He it is who causes the corn to grow for man. He gives
every fish that a man eats. Even if things are terrible yet they are
God's, and the Lord will still the storm for their faith in Him--tame
a storm, as a man might tame a wild beast--for his Father measures the
waters in the hollow of his hand, and men are miserable not to know it.
For himself, I repeat, his faith is enough; he sleeps on his pillow nor
dreams of perishing.
On the individual miracles of this class, I have not much to say. The
first of them was wrought in the animal kingdom.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account